


By Your Side

by BladeOfViolet



Category: Voltron - Fandom, Voltron: Legendary Defender, Voltron: Lion Voltron, Voltron: Vehicle Voltron
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Blood and Injury, Bonding Moments Apply, Brothers, Cuban Lance (Voltron), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt Lance (Voltron), Hurt/Comfort, I'm Bad At Tagging, I'm so mean to Lance I'm sorry, Injured Lance (Voltron), Injury, Keith & Lance (Voltron) Friendship, Keith (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings, M/M, Mentions of Other Charaters, Orphan Keith (Voltron), Psychological Torture, Torture, Violence, Voltron, klance, possibly klance if you squint, trigger warnings apply, voltron verse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-02
Updated: 2018-12-16
Packaged: 2019-04-17 08:26:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 28,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14184906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BladeOfViolet/pseuds/BladeOfViolet
Summary: Keith takes on his latest mission with the full intention of completing it in order to further contribute to the Blade of Marmora's efforts in the war against the Galran Empire. It was no different to any other mission he'd taken on before. That was until he found the Galran's with something that didn't belong to them.OR(Text Caption: Keith saw them come into view, the prisoner held limp between two Galra that dragged his feet behind them. The Blade’s hand drew closer to the pad, almost touching it now. Three ticks.Two.One.Then he froze.His breath caught in his throat threatening to choke him.His hand never fully came to rest on the touchpad, his violet eyes widening as he watched the scene unfold before him.The purple light of the corridors revealed the whole image in crystal clarity.)





	1. A Simple Mission

**Author's Note:**

> Honestly I'm not sure how this idea wormed its way into my head but here you have it. 
> 
> Please do heed the graphic violence warning and read the tags. If you are not okay with this sort of thing please do not read this fanfic.

Keith crouched in the shadows cast by the Galra battleship’s interior walls, knife in his right hand and held tight against his chest while he scanned the current visible layout for any sign of sentries. Two ticks later he launched himself from the wall and sprinted six paces along the dimly lit hallway before pressing his back to another shadow. 

Progress through the battleship had been painfully slow since the mission started. Intel had proven correct so far, save from the fact it failed to mention the sheer number of Galra guard that were crawling over the ship, not to mention the sentries. It had been difficult getting in and he had had to use all his training since officially becoming a member of the Blade of Memoria just over 3 months ago, but it was a welcome challenge. Never before had he been trusted with a mission of this complexity or importance, least of all as a solo infiltrator. He knew the dangers and his deployment had been optional but their Leader’s logic made sense. Being human gave him the smallest stature the Blades had to offer and this mission demanded that above all, particularly at evac, if he could only reach the target. 

Ten ticks passed.

Keith moved again, swallowing ground with every lithe stride, his lightly armoured boots barely making a sound on the cold metal floor. Training with the Blades had substantially enhanced his natural gift for being light-footed and he mentally praised whatever heavens this galaxy held for it when he saw the sentry pair march past the crossing only six metres ahead. A quarter of a tick later he’d already merged with the next shadow and held his breath while the patrol passed, seemingly unaware of his almost catastrophic slip up. 

As they slipped out of sight Keith dared to breathe again from behind his mask. Crouching low he opened the holographic map on his bracer and checked his current route. 

He was on target. Good. No alternative routes seemed to be available…

Fine. Then he’d have to endure at this slow pace, at least until he had secured the target. 

Another several doubashes later he’d successfully infiltrated the lower loading bay of the battleship and stowed himself away atop a stack of cargo. The crate he was in was tiny and not for the first time Keith counted his blessings for being relatively small. He even spared a few ticks of sympathy to whichever poor Galra may have ended up trying to fit inside had he not accepted the mission himself. Of course there were alternative places to conceal oneself until contact with the target but none of which were much larger than the one Keith had chosen.

The cargo listings he’d managed to pull up from a remote hangar control panel had indicated the particular shipment set he was hiding in had previously been an export from Khiro Beta Base and therefore shouldn’t be exported at the battleships next destined slot: Larent Outpost in Krillant inner sector. Here the battleship should unload a faulty amplifier and several other damaged equipment pieces in exchange for upgraded replacement parts before moving onto a Galra base on the ground of planet Khiro itself, just past the asteroid belt. If his intel held true that was where the target in question would be imported. That meant he had at least two varga before target contact.

Letting out a small sigh Keith shifted from his knees to slouching against the crates walls. He’d never been very patient. Kolivan really hadn’t been joking around when he said this would test all of Keith’s skills and resolve. At least it wasn’t completely dark in the crate, the latch he’d pried open allowed the side panel to remain open just short of an inch, revealing a crack of Galra life that bustled around the purple lit hangar. 

For a moment Keith observed the scene, primarily consisting of lower ranking Galra soldiers that were preparing what he assumed was the next export items and updating the logs from the previous import. The dull, beeping of pulleys and rigs sounded from the far side of the loading bay as a group of at least fifteen Galrans worked to secure outstanding cargo. Opposite that was a standard set of three scanner bays that were currently analysing a set of hand-held cannons.

Nothing abnormal to report. 

Five more doubashes of crate-darkness later and Keith pulled up the target hologram one last time to familiarise himself with the item. The pale blue light shimmered to life, taking the form of a microchip that was said to measure approximately 5mm by 10mm. The first batch of these manufactured was scheduled to be brought onboard from Khiro ground base following a successful line of testing. His briefing had indicated they were programmed with a new, heavily modified targeting system used for battleship class targeting systems and above. That was all he’d been told. Get in, attain the target, get out, don’t get noticed, take only one chip and replace it with an empty microchip so everything would go unnoticed. Theoretically.

Disengaging the hologram Keith returned himself to his solitary darkness.

Half a varga later the ship jolted slightly, indicating the reverse thrusters had just kicked in to aid the ship’s landing process. 

All at once the activity within the loading bay seemed to increase threefold as the crew’s primary focus became cargo exchange. 

Using the distraction Keith slipped down from his hiding place and made for the rear data access column; the area now vacant of any activity. Tapping in a few codes and bypassing the Galran’s equivalent of the most basic firewall in existence he began downloading recent shipment data. 

The download ended and a few ticks later the area was still vacant. 

Additional intel obtained Keith returned to his stowaway and waited.

The battleship returned to space once more and Keith’s fingers traced the hilt of his knife repetitively as he fought his naturally thin patience to hold out. It was an unconscious habit he’d developed months ago now, shortly after leaving Team Voltron. Only when a pair of Galra footsteps drew closer, until they were almost directly below his high up stowaway did Keith halt the habitual action. 

“I heard they took him to the upper level prison bay. That’s all I got.”

“Must be important if the witch has been showing an interest.”

“Yeah. In under half a varga she’ll be off this ship too. I heard she’s leaving ship at our next stop along with the prisoner.”

“That’ll be a relief. She…unnerves all of my men. I’d rather ten audiences with the Emperor himself than her.”

“Agreed.”

“My next breaks in six doubashes.”

“Mines not for another five varga…”

As they rounded the corner and drew further away Keith lost hearing of them altogether. For a moment he frowned, processing their conversation. Then he relaxed a little again. The witch they had mentions most likely reference Haggar and if she was on board this ship his mission could become a whole lot more problematic that he though. She was trouble for anyone and still an anomaly to all alliances working against the Empire, including Voltron. His mission was already half way complete though and there had been no signs so far to suggest that anyone – witch included – had detected an unwelcome presence on board. Keith’s most logical course of action would therefore be to continue as planned and get off-ship as soon as possible. 

Whoever their prisoner was had more chance of ascending to the position of Emperor than getting out alive if Haggar was involved. If whatever remained of their life held even a little mercy then hopefully they would pass from it shortly after transfer at the ground base. But the witch was cruel. Even now it angered him to think that Shiro may have had prolonged direct contact with her before. 

Shiro…

It had been a month since he’d last seen the Castle’s crew in person. Keith often wondered how they were doing and a small part of him he didn’t often dwell on missed them. They were by far better company than the Blade. Everyone at base was thoroughly reserved. The most conversation happened only post-training and at mission briefs and debriefs. There was virtually no out of mission conversation, not like there was with the Team Voltron. 

Back on the Castle of Lions they would usually storm the kitchen for food or retire to the lounge after missions. Pidge would set to work instantly on some new tech to counter the ones they’d just gone up against. Hunk would talk to himself mostly about a new idea for improving the food goo even further. Shiro would seemingly absorb himself in his own thoughts between surfing the rooms current conversations and Lance would sprawl out and complain endlessly about being tired and how his effort in their last fight would simply never look as awesome to the team as it actually was to him. While Keith never got involved in any of their conversations he couldn’t deny missing them. It was a welcome distraction compared to the silence he’d acclimatised to since joining the Blade. A slight smile broke Keith’s expression at the memory. 

Just over two weeks ago Keith had briefly spoken to his team (or rather his old team) over visual comms after Kolivan had concluded his official meeting with Allura and the Paladins. They had all seemed well, yet something had concerned Keith. Something about them was off. Allura’s saddened expression had been the first to give it away when he’d awkwardly asked how everyone was doing. They had all answered positively, aside from Pidge and Lance who weren’t present. Apparently, Pidge had more urgent research to advance upon in the lab and Keith hadn’t even bothered to ask after Lance. It wouldn’t be the first time he was absent from the meetings just to catch up on sleep or, more likely, to attend to his excessively long skincare routine. In hindsight that was probably while the team seemed a little off. They had just returned from a gruelling offensive fight as Voltron and Lance’s lack of commitment to the important meetings that followed had likely irked the team a little. It definitely used to annoy Keith. Sometimes a little more than he cared to admit even to himself.

The battleship shuddered slightly as it cleared planet Khiro’s outermost shields. 

Keith prepared himself.

Half a varga later the shipment was on board. 

Target in sight. 

Hi target was scanned by the Galran soldiers, recorded and secured in section D with only two sentries patrolling the section. 

Keith waited, analysing their pattern. 

Every three doubashes they passed the target. 

Two doubashes later Keith had successfully secured the target, replaced it and resealed the shipment. His efforts had gone entirely unnoticed.

Good. 

Now to get out. 

Following the same route he arrived by, Keith traced his steps out, using the shadows for cover and occasionally concealing himself in unoccupied storage areas while the heavier patrols passed. 

Two levels up and the patrols thickened, becoming a mix of both patrolling sentries and Galran soldiers, most of which the latter remained stationary at points along Keith’s route. 

Ceasing his advancement Keith remained in his current shadow, kindly provided by one of the wall’s many protruding ribs. He analysed the area, eyes drinking in every option forward from his current point. Rolling his lower lip between his teeth he though fast.  
His current exit route was blocked. Keith could see no way at all that he was making it out the way he came in with security this tight. The alternate route he had memorised was also blocked and the third provided by Kolivan’s resource was swamped with druids which was not at all shocking given his latest discovery of the witch being on board. That definitely had not been included in his brief and by logical deduction of the situation the Blades had not known or he would never have been sent on this mission, least of all alone. Those three options removed only left the option of moving up another two levels. It would mean bypassing a weapons storage section and the prison block but would keep him clear of the labs where Haggar was most likely to be.  
Mind made up Keith turned and backtracked to his last turn from a fork in the battleships maze of dully lit purple corridors and slipped down the less guarded route leading upwards. 

The guard was still incredibly tight but not impossibly so which was a good sign. He checked his mission clock. This was going to be tight. He only had a three doubash window in which he could evacuate the ship if he continued along this route at this speed.

Only three…

It would have to do. Any quicker and he risked blowing his own cover. Slower was definitely not an option either. 

With little delay he passed the weapons storage and proceeded on to the prison block. Keith had almost past the block completely when a heavy clucking of metal scrapped along the floor and a bulkhead to his right released. 

Keith had only a tick to get into cover. He made it in half, diving into an unlit (and thankfully unoccupied) room no larger than an office would be back home, where he crouched low and listened. 

Footsteps. Two sets of them from his deduction. 

Keith was about to rise to peer through the window from his dark enclosure when a voice halted his ascent and made his skin crawl. It felt like someone had just showed ice down his suit. 

A druid.

“Notify the ground craw to prepare Interrogation Cell Two immediately.”

“We will not be taking Him straight to the cells?” It was a Galra voice, spoken as if he was high in rank but voice trembling slightly. Perhaps with uncertainty? Fear? Keith couldn’t blame them for that, the druids were-

“No. See to it the Cell is ready for use.” 

The icy voice scratched along the airwaves and apparently meant the druid was taking leave of this upper level. Keith watched it float away from the two Galrans without waiting for a response, only daring to watch from a corner as far from the window he could get.

“As you wish.” 

Keith carefully felt the wall, looking for an alternate exit and finding one to the rear in the form of a touch activated door release. 

The higher ranking Galra shouted beyond the bulkhead, further than the young Blade could see.

“Bring him though. We’re moving the prisoner now!” 

Then he vanished, presumably to carry out the druid’s orders while his subordinate remained stationed at the bulkhead. 

Keith’s hand found the pad, his gloved hand lingering above it. When the prisoner passed he would move. That would be when their focus would be best occupied.

In the distance he heard four sets of footsteps, two of which seemed heavier than usual for Galrans, as though they were baring more weight than usual. 

The prisoner. 

Keith saw them come into view, the prisoner held limp between two Galra that dragged his feet behind them. The Blade’s hand drew closer to the pad, almost touching it now. Three ticks. 

Two.

One.

Then he froze. 

His breath caught in his throat threatening to choke him.

His hand never fully came to rest on the touchpad, his violet eyes widening as he watched the scene unfold before him.

The purple light of the corridors revealed the whole image in crystal clarity.

The dead weight between Galra arms, human limbs heavily secured by purple glowing beams and cuffs, and leaving a subtle trail of crimson blood behind, was Lance.


	2. The Red Paladin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Keith chooses between his mission and his friend while Lance falls into the nightmare that has become his every waking moment.

Keith just stared, his eyes wide with shock, heart racing.

He couldn’t move. He needed to.

The mission… Lance was their prisoner.

He was right in front of him being dragged like a lump of chewed up meat in the vice-like grip of two Galrans.

He wasn’t even conscious.

Keith wanted to get out of his concealed position. He wanted to cut them down. Free Lance. Move. Twitch. Scream. Anything!

But he couldn’t.

Part of him blamed it on shock. The more prominent part of it was a spiderweb-thin wire of control telling him if he did any of those he would give away his position and likely get himself caught in the process. Capture was of no concern to him but Keith could just hear Shiro’s voice even now warning him that his capture would compromise everything. More importantly, it would ensure Lance remained their prisoner.

Keith could engage. He was certain the four Galra soldiers would be no problem to eliminate. In fact, the adrenaline coursing through his veins like lava over ice ensured it. He could tear them all apart right now but the two druids tailing them… the druids, he had no idea how to defeat them. His only previous encounter with one of them had left him in full retreat, having failed to even so much as mark the masked creature. So against his own will Keith stayed put, violet eyes numbly analysing the situation.

He watched them drag his ex-teammate – his friend – towards the direction Keith had just come from. Watched them take him further and further away.

Then he snapped out of it.

The young blade moved like lighting as he frantically searched his hiding spot for an exit that would allow him to follow. He could almost scream when nothing revealed itself. Then, just as he was about to count his chances and take them head on anyway via the main exit, he spotted it. A ventilation duct with the grate securely intack…

Not for long.

Without a second though Keith rammed his luxite blade between the metal wall and the grate and yanked, prying it slowly open with a grunt.

Too slow.

Keith braced his feet against the wall and put all his weight into it. Almost there, almost enough for him to fit past almost –

The young Blade froze, eyes snapping to look out of the window once more as several angry shouts reached his ears at once.

Lance was no longer in the Galran’s grasp.

He was running. Sort of. It looked more like he was just limping quickly. His strides were uneven and he wobbled dangerously but hell he was trying.

“Take him down!”

The Galran’s opened fire. Two of the soldiers shots at Lance came heat wrenchingly close and the lucky Sharpshooter actually dodge them the little –

Then one hit.

Keith heard him cry out before his eyes could register the laser soaring through Lance’s unarmoured calf. His knees buckled and he hit the ground hard, the impact audible even from behind the door and Keith nearly flinched as he wondered if kneecaps could actually take that much force.

‘Keep moving… _please_ keep moving,’ Keith hissed, damn near praying the Sharpshooter would do it. 

But Lance was doubled over on all fours and breathing hard. Two ticks before the Sharpshooter’s resolve kicked into overdrive and he started to push himself back up on his hands.

He wasn’t fast enough though.

The druids got him, both shooting blades of purple lightening through his body and Lance screamed. His wafer-thin strength caved, his elbows gave out and he crumbled just as the soldiers caught up and crushed him to the ground with an armoured boot to his back.

That was when Lance stropped struggling.

The bolts of lightning continued even after the boy’s body fell limp and Keith saw red. Fists clenched he bit his teeth together hard feeling the skin of his palms bruise with the pressure but it was all he could do to stay put. The Galrans were talking. Laughing. But Keith couldn’t hear them past the thumping in his eardrums.

He watched only a moment longer, just long enough to see them hurl Lance’s prone body back into their grasp before Keith pulled himself into the air duct and slid the first few feet into it. Then he started crawling faster than he thought was humanly possible.

A combination of the Blade’s shuffling movements through the narrow space and the thick metal walls separating him from the main corridor meant he’d lost all sound from what was happening beyond the duct’s interior now. Not that he had much of a choice but the ventilation ducts could only take him so far so Keith began looking for a clear exit from them.

He found one.

It wasn’t clear.

It would be soon.

Keith readied his blade, watching the edge awaken to its full length out of the corner of his eye as he rammed the heel of his boot into the grate and jumped, driving the blade right through the sentry’s head and severing its central processing unit. Sparkes tingled around the skeletal body as exposed conductors contacted the metal shell and the sentry collapsed, the sound echoing through the room but not beyond the closed door Keith was already making for. In less than a tick he’d crossed the room opened it, peering outside at an empty corridor.

He’d lost track of them.

He’d let them out of his sight for _2 doubashes_ and he’d _flippling lost sight of_ -!

_“Yeah. In under half a varga she’ll be off this ship too. I heard she’s leaving ship at our next stop along with the prisoner.”_

Keith’s mind reeled with that invaluable snipped of conversation he’d intruded upon only about a varga earlier and his heart raced. He had lost sight of them but that didn’t matter. If what those Galran soldiers had said was true – and Lance was clearly being transferred – then Keith already knew where they were heading. As long as he could get off-ship and fast he hadn’t lost yet. He could find Lance from there.

Before his train of thought had even concluded he was moving, heading straight for the loading bay he’d spent the last two varga waiting in. Back then he’d just been waiting for the target. Just waiting while one of his own Team was locked away in some cell like an animal. Keith felt anger burn in his chest for that. Anger at himself.

Keith knew the Galra were merciless, cruel and took no hesitation to the works of torture. Hell he knew that from Shiro. Yet despite all the anger and fury he felt at knowing Shiro had been a prisoner of their’s he had thankfully never seen it. Not until now. Only this time it wasn’t Shiro, and any other time Keith might have counted a thousand blessings to that, but in reality – what he had just witnessed – it made the truth no easier to swallow. Shiro or Lance. It didn’t matter. Lance could be a pain in the neck at the best of times but nothing that annoying flirt had ever done could warrant what he’d just been put through.

And _gods_ Keith had never seen the Sharpshooter look so weak. That idiot’s stubbornness could rival his own and yet despite all its enormity Lance had barely managed to retain his resolve to fight back there.

The Blade shook his head, banishing the wandering thoughts that occupied his mind. Now was not the time. He could not let them risk jeopardising his new mission. He had to succeed in getting off this awful ship and locating Lance.

The mission…

Keith’s mission, the one given to him by Kilovan of the Blade of Marmora. His evac team would be waiting just outside the planet’s atmosphere for him to deliver the target. To complete his mission. To fulfill his duty.

To hell with his mission.

Curse his overworking mind for even daring to think about that mission right now.

Even if it was important, even if it did mean staying one step ahead in the war, Keith could not leave his teammate – his friend – with those beasts. He could go back and relay his findings to the Blade and the Castle of Lions and then they could all return here in force to rescue their Sharpshooter, but if Keith did that… if he returned and Lance was already gone…if they were too late…

No.

He had no choice.

Keith had to do this alone. He could not fail. That wasn’t even an option and he wrote it off the mental list for good as he rounded another corner and eliminated two lone sentries before gliding into cover once more.

 

* * *

 

 

Ten doubashes later and Keith had just finished watching his teammate be dragged off the main loading bay cargo ramp with absolutely no way of being able to follow him further and remain undetected.

Another five doubashes after that he got his chance in the form of an empty cargo crate being removed from the ship. One of twenty to be exact.

It was another eleven doubashes until his crate got checked in with the others and the uneasy rocking movement came to a halt when it was abandoned with the other empties in a holding bay just inside the Galra base, presumably awaiting scanning since the Blade had not yet been detected.

It was at this point Keith left the confines of the crate and sprinted under their cover to a side exit of the holding bay.

He had no idea where he was going.

All he knew was he had to find Lance and he had to do it now.

 

* * *

 

 

It was a whole two varga, Keith thinks, before he actually found where ‘Interrogation Cell Two’ was located in this godforsaken maze of a base. It was only with all his efforts, uncontained adrenaline and a planet full of luck that the Blade had not yet been spotted. Or at least, he hadn’t been spotted by anyone who had lived to report his unwelcome presence.

Two varga had felt like two days of Earth time. It had passed painfully slow and yet too fast all at the same time. Slow because progress had been gruelling and fast because Keith was pretty sure whatever this ‘Interrogation Cell’ was didn’t hold a nice comfy chair and soft lighting inside. That and he knew from the guards that Lance had been taken there immediately meaning every tick Keith wasted coming up short at dead ends could mean another tick of hell for the Sharpshooter.

As it turns out ‘Interrogation Cell’ Blocks were pretty hard to locate and had only being listed on the latest control base he had pulled up a map on because it held a vague amount of data on the Druid labs. That knowledge only left a sickening feeling in the young Blade’s gut when he discovered they were on that same level and he feared for Lance more that he’d feared for him when the bridge had exploded back on the castle. Back they had all found him unconscious among the rubble and littered with burns. That had been easier than the now though. They didn’t have to pass two levels of heavy security and the occasional druid when that had happened.

Not that Keith though much of it. He was selfless. He had always been selfless when it concerned people he cared about. He only cared for a very small number of people, so few of them in fact that they could be counted using just his hands.

It was only then that Keith realised that Lace was one of those few.

 

* * *

 

 

Lance remembered when it first went wrong. He’d been souring, cutting through the vast black vacuum of space with bittersweet ease, like a hot knife through butter. The golden heat of the nearest star had burned so bright the golden rays had reached Red’s metal armoured plates from where they flew on the very outskirts of its galaxy. The Sharpshooter had even basked in the beauty of those rays momentarily before sending Red into a nosedive and _by the heavens_ could she _move_. Sure they were being attacked by a small fleet but none their fighters even compared to his lion and they were each falling prey to Red’s jaws and piercing fire one by one.

They were unstoppable.

They were winning.

Then a blinding purple light clipped the corner of Lance’s vision and he barely managed to activate his full mask in time before the cockpit erupted into a brilliant white.

He doesn’t remember anything after that.

Neither does Red.

All that was left of them was a battered Lion with a hole burned straight through the sides of its head and a Paladin coloured red, floating among the metal debris.

 

* * *

 

 

The Blue Paladin remembers the first time he awoke into this nightmare.

And the second time.

And the third.

He remembers them all. He remembers being thrown at Zarkon’s feet where he was first promised pain. He remembers being taken to the cells for the druids to work their magic on his insubordination. He remembers the witch – Haggar – taking over from the masked phantoms when he still refused to talk.

That was when things got really bad.

Haggar wasn’t like the druids. Heck the druid’s work seemed like child’s play next to her methods. Not physically of course, her methods had been on par with them for that, but mentally she was _evil_.

The first time Haggar had worked her dark aura into his mind he’d flat out panicked. The breath had left his lungs, the fear had crushed him and no air ever returned to them again before he’d passed out. The second time wasn’t much better either. Or the many other times that followed. She would just plunge into his thoughts; his memories. Claw would yank and snatch at memories he held dear. Memories he loved and others that he hated and some that he didn’t even know he had. Yet every time she’d come close to discovering anything about Voltron or about his family back on the Castle, Lance had flooded his thought with everything and anything he could to drag her under the waves of control he still held over his own mind. It was one of the hardest things he’d ever had to do and, more often than not, the impulsive grab he made for irrelevant memories of his past left him deflated, a heavy ache burning in his chest. Days at the Garrison, days back in school, primary school, that stupid dance class his mum had signed him up to at seven, the teddy bear club, the day he lost his cat to a drunk driver, his first time in the simulator…

The Sharpshooters onslaught of memories would bombard the witch until she reluctantly withdrew from his mind and then he would laugh when she’d try asking him verbally for the information she desired once more. That only ever pissed her off though. That only ended in more physical pain which left blood trickling across battered skin and exhaustion engulfing him like a marshmallow over campfire flames.

But at least his memories were safe.

At least his family back home were safe.

At least Voltron and his friends were safe.

 

* * *

 

 

During his fourth, session with Haggar (Lances impulsive, charismatic self had thought how kind it was of her to devote so much time to him) he learnt that his Lion hadn’t been captured with him. It was a Galra soilder that let it slip as he’d tied Lance down to a cold metal table. The Sharpshooter never did see that one again. The last time he ever saw him he was being lead out of the room by two druids while Lance drowned in the overwhelming relief that his lion was safe.

Good job too. He’s pretty sure Keith would have killed him if she wasn’t.

That was the best news he thought he’d ever heard in his life. It kept him going for longer, lifting his spirits slightly. Haggar had hated that. He could see it in wrinkles of her half-cloaked face.

Part of Lance thinks that is why, three sessions following the revelation, Haggar changed her mind games slightly.

Instead of plaguing his thoughts directly the witch had started toying with his mind using near perfect apparitions and visions of his team. The first one had been Shiro who’d walked straight up to him while he was alone in his cell and simply opened the door with his right arm. Her sorcery had Lance almost thoroughly convinced he was being rescued, right up until the moment when Shiro had asked him if he knew where the rest of the Paladins were so they could set the Escape pod course to their location.

At that point Lance knew. Lance realised it was all fake. He knew nobody had really come to rescue him and when he fought Shiro, refusing to leave his cell, the apparition had shattered and with it so had the blossoming hope of rescue in the Blue Paladin’s heart. The ordeal had nearly crushed him and he’d spent the next varga curled in the corner of his cell with both knees drawn up to his chest refusing to let tears fall.

After that she’d sent Pidge.

Then Hunk.

Then Allura.

Then Keith.

Each time one of his friends came Lance would curse his stupidity for when his eyes caught sight of them his foolish heart would dare to hope that maybe, just maybe, this time it was _real_.

But it never was.

Each time the apparitions would slip up, some of them more quickly than others, and once the Sharpshooter had identified their flaws they would shatter like glass and once more he’d be left alone in the near darkness of his cell with a blank expression on his face.

He refused to give anyone the satisfaction of seeing him hurt, so he would show none.

Inside he would break a little more.

Then, through each break, despair would leak into the holes of his heart.

_At least they were safe._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Firstly: Thank you so much to everyone who has commented, left kudos and taken the time to read this fanfiction so far!! I may have crumbled a little on the inside at the initial response it got (in a good way) and I really hope I can make it live up to your expectations...please bear with me while I work on that. 
> 
> I managed to get this chapter written a bit quicker than I thought I would and I'll try to have the next one up within a weeks time. 
> 
> As always, let me know your thoughts and feel free to message me if you have questions.


	3. Breaking Blue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance struggles to cling onto what small remnants of fighting will he has left while Keith implements his worst plan yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning for this one:
> 
> Heads up for violence, swearing, (graphic) torture scenes, physical and psychological torture.   
> Also some killing. Blame Keith for that one.

When Lance came around it was to the sickening lull of his body being dragged and the agonising tug each slight movement it gave on his newest wounds. It took him a long while, too long he thinks, to push aside the pain in his throbbing head enough to think semi-clearly so that he could actually figure out why the cold metal floor he’d collapsed on was moving so much.

Unable to comprehend it he dared to open his eyes, barely enough to see past damp lashes. The floor was moving… or was he moving over it? Bile rose in his throat and he nearly chocked as he swallowed fast. He couldn’t be sick now. Now was his chance. Now might be his only chance. So with one last shaky breath he snapped into action, slammed his bare foot into an armoured Galra's toe, utilised their shock, gritted his teeth hard and ran.

Lance gasped, the first step threatening to send him into the clutches of gravity as he seriously underestimated how weak he was.

Hell no!

They _would not_ give out now.

So he ran, breathing hard, the air burning his lungs all too soon.

He heard the shots, their sound like quite music barely audible above the storm that thundered in his ears from the effort.

Then the air left his lungs without permission as the white hot pain echoed upwards from his leg and ripped a scream from his throat without his permission. His knees collided with the hard metal but he didn’t even feel it as the shot he’d taken threatened to consume him.

No.

No no no no…  not now. Not yet.

He didn’t want to die.

He had to _move_.

So he did. He poured everything he had into hulling his weight up onto his hands. Then someone shattered the only strength he had left to give and crushed him back to the ground.

And Lance tried to look up. Tried to look to wherever he’d been heading and silently begged that if this was to be his last stand then this moment would at least grant him a glimpse of daylight – true daylight - one last time. Not that awful shade of purple he'd been confined to. 

But only the dim purple light crawled across the dark metal surfaces and then all he felt was pain. Not just in his leg but all over. It lashed across his skin, burnt his bones and ripped him apart before some sweet angle of mercy dragged him down into the darkness once more.

 

* * *

 

 

Deep in the in one of the five innermost sectors of Khiro ground base two Galra, closely tailed by another pair of soldiers and a druid, stood before a door while the pad sensors scanned the hand of the Commander now leading the group. In a flash of green light, the characteristic bleep of acceptance sounded and the door latched retracted, allowing the metal structure to pull up into the wall and open a path to the room before them; the identity tag reading “Interrogation Room 2”.

Once inside the two Galrans deposited their not-so-heavy load against an upright structure as instructed and let the druid took over, tightly securing metal restraints that still sported burs at their edges. One each for the wrists, one for the prisoner’s mid-section and one to bind both feet together. One foot was still bleeding, a dark blue bruise already climbing up the ankle beneath split skin.

The Galrans retreated from the room, their expressions blank.

“Damn Paladin wrecked my boot. I’m off to clean it before we launch again.”

“Not as bad as your boot wrecked his foot.”

The first Galran – the one with a crimson boot – scoffed at that.

They both walked in silence for a few doubashes.

“Was it worth transferring him here?”

“Why are you asking?”

“He doesn’t look like he’s got much fight left in him…”

“He won’t last long. They never do here.” A pause. “Remember that Champion? The Human one?”

“Yeah. Lost his arm. It was a good fight.”

“Well he survived. I heard rumours he became one of them.”

“The rebels?”

“No. A Paladin.”

“Squatracks! He wouldn’t have survived. He was a prisoner after that again and none of them ever seem to survive here.”

“No. He didn’t come here though.”

“Oh.”

“That one back there, he’s the first human we’ve had.”

“…Better off dying in the ring as a loser to another’s strength than here.”

“Yeah. It’d be quicker too.”

 

* * *

 

 

Drums. Thumping.

Too loud. Everything was too loud.

He just wanted it to stop but the little critters in his mind clawed at his brain with tiny pickaxes again and again and again.

Some of the critters had relocated to his leg and turned in their pickaxes for saws.

There’s no way being dead could hurt this much.

So… he was alive…

Lance’s stomach coiled at the thought and a heave racked his body until he gagged, unable to throw anything up because it had already been purged of food so long ago. So long that he’d since given up trying to track the days when his luck had turned South. Bitterly, he thought, that was putting it lightly.

A cold, bony hand curled around his chin and snapped him from his thoughts, grossly long fingernails cutting into his cheeks.

“Get up!”

Lance groaned, trying to actually find the resolve to open his eyelids when a bolt of electricity shot through his fingertips and coursed through his body like wildfire to a forest.

He screamed, eyes flying open and clouding over with tears.

It fell on deaf ears.

The pain stopped and his heart pounded as it sunk impossibly lower into the depths of misery; his once bright blue eyes found the witch before him. Her stale breath caught in his nose from where she stood, merely an inch from his face although it didn’t even bother Lance anymore. He’d grown used to it.

“Voltron. The Black Lion. The Castle of Lions. Tell me where they are.”

Not a question. An order. As it always was.

The wounded boy just stared at her through dull eyes that barely even saw what was in front of him. It was a game. A game they had played for what felt like forever now.

A little piece of what remained of Lance shattered as he unwillingly sold himself to the game. Devoting himself to a silence uncharacteristic of his natural self, secured him a spot as a main player in this sadistic round. He knew what came next. He knew he should prepare for it or at the very least steel his emotions and attempt to pick up some scraps of resolve to combat what was about to happen, but he no longer cared enough about himself to do so. What was the point? He doubted he’d ever get out now and while his heart cried out with a foolish hope of rescue a selfless spark found warmth in the fact that they weren’t coming to rescue him. If he wasn’t being rescued then his team wasn’t in danger and that meant they were safe.  They could live-

The witch hissed: “Do it.”

Lance’s head fell downward to stare at the floor from where he was restrained, arms over his head and limbs stretched wide on the upright Y-Beam. Salty water that had nothing to do with the shock he’d just taken trickled down his cheeks and along his nose before smashing into thousands of little droplets of the floor. He watched them fall through blurred vision, doing his best to ignore the two druids impaling his bruised veins on either arm with their needles. Trying to ignore the icy burst that raced through is veins when their content was injected into him.

It was a liquid metal. Of sorts. Something the witch had developed to help amplify the pain received from the shocks. Lance remembers when she first tried to explain the solution’s composition to him, how the iron content was increased and particles were made compatible with human bodies. But Lance hadn’t listened at the time. He just remembers the _fear_ he felt and he’d fought hard not to show it, covering the emotion with some of his best verbal comebacks. 

Now he doesn’t have to hide the fear. He’s too tired to show it even if he wanted to.

The druids step away.

“You will tell me everything…”

No he won’t.

“…one way or another…”

No he won’t. He wouldn’t betray them.

“…I will break it out of you…”

No. Never.

“…Just like we broke your Black Paladin, piece by piece.”

Thank the gods, _oh thank the gods_ it was him here instead of Shiro.

If there are any gods…

Then the bright blue sparks lap across his skin and Lance screams his heart out until the zaps of electricity are downed beneath them entirely. The witch tore them from his raw throat until his voice went completely while the shocks burnt his skin beneath the charring black bodysuit, each shock lasting longer than the last until he finally passed out. Then they would force him to come around again and he would scream for them again.

 

* * *

 

 

Black wisps coiled through images, their dark fingers curling softly around small snips of bright, warm memory. Sometimes they would engulf them in their midnight blanket. Other times they would tenderly weave around them and move onto another, moving in hypnotic patterns like the smoke of a candle’s flame being blown lightly away. The action was so gentle and loving it left a crushing ache squeezing at the young human's heart. An ache that was only added to with the weight of the warm snippets of light the darkness danced around.

One showed his family half of which were exercising the most supreme sibling rivalry as the elders fought to get them to just be quiet for a second while the camera flashed to capture them all in a time old photograph. 

In the next one: a Mama embracing her lean son who towered over her in an orange garrison uniform, tears of happiness and pride spilling from lightly wrinkled eyes.

Another showed a Christmas by a fire and a large family wrapped up in boughs of laughter and surrounded by discarded wrapping paper. An elderly lady was present caught between smiling joyfully at her grandchildren and dozing in an armchair. Again the brown haired boy was present, desperately trying to play ponies with a young girl who still hadn’t fully mastered walking while also attempting to help a slightly older boy to construct a toy race track. 

Then the boy was more grown up again and holding his hand out confidently to a larger, unsuspecting boy who fumbled with an armful of textbooks and dropped them in surprise. The lean boy laughed and a hand reached to nervously scratch at the nape of his neck while the larger boy recovered from his shock and mouthed his four-letter name in return to the lean boy’s greeting.

The next warm memory was quickly engulfed in black, but not before a dark-haired boy sporting the most ridiculous mullet walked into a classroom late, looking about as lost as a nun in a strip club before locating a seat at the back and sinking into it.

Then there was a small boy with chestnut hair tapping away at the bright LED screen of a touch pad and snacking on donuts beside the larger boy and the lean one. Something on the screen had fully captivated their attention and made the trio smile.

Darkness consumed the next one: the most beautiful metal structure whose eyes gleamed yellow as a brilliant sapphire blue barrier collapsed around it.

The last one was of a whole group of people: the tallest wore a scar across the bridge of his nose, the larger one was there, so was the one with the mullet and the small boy - no, not a boy, a girl wearing boys clothes- the lean one, and a guy clad in blue with the craziest ginger mustache. There was a lady too with the longest, most beautiful white hair the lean one had ever seen. They were laughing. All of them were laughing. Even the dark coils surrounding the memory hesitated before concealing this one.

The memories hurt. All of them hurt so badly it felt like he couldn’t breathe. The young man’s breath hitched harshly and had he been conscious he might have smile. It would have been a sad smile, one filled with deep longing, but it would have been a true smile nonetheless.

The hurt – this hurt – he would always welcome into his heart, he though. He wasn’t even sure if the memories were all real anymore but he would treasure them all the same because they were everything to him. They were all he had now.

So he hoped that soon, when the time came and he went to sleep for the last time, these memories would be there waiting for him to say goodbye to. 

 

* * *

 

 

Lance blinked slowly, the darkness wrapping around his mind clearing as his eyes squinted up into the harsh golden light that shone blindingly bright above him.

The pain was the first to great him into consciousness.

It always was. Only each time it was much more prominent. Much stronger.

This time it was almost unbearable.

The next thing the Sharpshooter was aware of, once had become mostly accustomed to the sharp electrical impulses overloading his neurons, was that he was no longer upright. He was laying down on a cold metal table, his body strapped down by thick leather cuffs at the wrists, ankles, waist and neck. They bit into his skin making already raw wounds hurt even more.

Around him he felt the foreboding presence of pain to come in the form of hooded phantoms and the cloaked Witch as they tinkered with objects nearby, each sound falling on his ears sparking a sinking dread in his heart. Lance steeled himself against the fear. The panic. The unwinding strings of his own grip on reality that were so nearly undone now.

“0.2 only. The other subject was larger. This one has a more pitiful build.”

A syringe was emptied somewhere beyond the Sharpshooter’s line of sight.

He flinched, cursing his body for portraying weakness.

“It is done. Energising now.”

Lance listened to the whine of machinery that came next, the steady droning of the motors captivating his wandering mind. Their sounds almost allowing some tension to escape his restrained muscles for a moment. Then it stopped and he heard the harsh tapping of pointed boots approaching.

The Witch loomed over him and he swallowed hard before meeting her gaze.

“ 'Lance McClain'. I will give you one last chance to give me the information I ask for. If you do not, I will begin taking things from you for every detail you withhold from me.”

Lance stared.

He tried to mentally prepare the mess inside his mind to play her game again.

“Where is Voltron?”

Silence.

“Where are your friends?”

Silence.

He tried – and failed – to re-adjust his wrists in the cuffs.

The witch was growing impatient, he could see her anger twisting at the already darkened features of her angular face. This time she outright snarled.

“Where is the Castle of Lions?”

Lace tore his eyes away, choosing to stare at the grey ceiling instead. Her gaze was unnerving. It was intense. He was certain it could see right through him. All his hopes, his fears, his doubts –

“I gave you a chance Paladin. Now I will take from you something in return for your insubordination.”

Lance laughed. Against all logic and reasoning he outright laughed, the sound gurgling in his throat and working its way past abused lips in a raspy sort of gasping. He couldn’t help it and in that fleeting moment he thought that he had finally gone utterly mad.

Even Haggar took a step back. That mad him laugh even harder. If the Paladin had taken the chance to look he’d have seen the confusion plastered to her face as cogs turned, wildly trying to apply reason to such an act in the face of torture.

The Sharpshooter struggled against the laughter to draw in breath, his lips moving of their own accord as his worn out voice attempted speech for the first time in weeks.

“Go for it. You will anyway. I saw what you did to Shiro.” His voice cracked on the last word, his heart swelling with the mention of his leader – his hero – straight from the Garrison days.

There was a pause while the Witch motioned to the Druids in the room and a few of them shifted around the small space as they applied themselves to the Witch's orders.

Lance swallowed, silently cursing his dry throat for being so difficult to work with: “What do you want?”

She was silent, a sinister smirk glistening on thin lips. Two could play at this game.

Fear clenched at Lances heart with cold fingers as the severity of his situation began to dawn on him hard. The laughter died as fast as it had come and he could feel a cold sweat breaking as he realised he wasn’t ever going to leave this place.

“My Arm? My Leg?”

He wasn’t ever going to leave but now… now he might not even die in one piece. Suddenly, despite all the pain he’d endured, he wasn’t sure he was ready for this. He wasn’t ready to see his body be ripped apart. He wasn’t ready-

“You misunderstand.”

Now the Witch was chuckling to herself and the sound scratching at the young Paladin’s eardrums “I’m not taking your limbs. They are of no use to me and I will gain nothing from that.”

Relief.

Pure, unconstrained relief coursed through Lance’s veins like cool oil through an overused engine.

“I’m going to take your senses.”

Time stilled. Lance could hear his heart hammer against his chest so hard it could break and the ringing in his ears started to consume him.

_No._

_No no no no no no…_

He hadn’t heard right. She was joking. She wouldn’t. She couldn’t. It was a bluff. It had to be.

“Start with his sight.”

Then the druids bony, skeletal hands were on him and his blue eyes fell upon a syringe in the Witch’s hand. It had been there all along but he’d only just noticed. How could he have missed it? It was right there.

It was going to break him.

The boy trembled hard, his whole body shaking violently as he tried to back away further into the metal table.

“No…”

The tip of the needle gleamed. Then it descended.

“No. No, _no please_ …”

His skin was punctured and Lance screamed, thrashing with more strength than his abused body should be able to muster, fighting the restraints and crying out as fear swallowed him whole. Screams, halted only by futile pleading, shattered the surrounding silence as he outright _begged_ , his eyes darting wildly around the cell in an attempt to never let go of his vision.

“No… _PLEASE NO_!!”

At first nothing happened.

Then blackness smothered the edges of his vision and he knew: he knew the last thing he would ever see was this Galra cell.

He couldn’t breathe. The shrinking hole through which he still saw vanished entirely and he couldn’t breathe.

The screaming stopped.

The air in the room was gone.

Lance’s head collided with the table hard and he still couldn’t draw in air as the terror held his lungs hostage. Crimson tears trickled from sightless eyes.

 

* * *

 

 

The prisoner cried silently for two whole vargas after the Druids obliterated his sight. His lips barely trembled and the shaky, unstable breathes were only made audible by their erratic occurrence. There was no resistance when the druids pulled the cuffs a notch tighter “to compensate for the stretch”. Not even a flinch or subtle twitch touched the boy’s lax features as the witch and her underlings continued their work on his marked body. When none of the prisoner’s attendants were talking the silence in the room rang louder than Church bells at the hour and if it wasn’t for the steady, seemingly endless stream of salty tears that leaked from the corner of his closed, unseeing eyes one might have believed the prisoner was unconscious.

The whole time they worked the Galra Commander stood watch from his post at the inside of the cell door, prepared to act should – against all the odds in this universe – the captured Paladin make it this far in a futile escape attempt. His armoured limbs stood to attention, entirely unyielding and expressionless to the cruelty before him while one hand held an electronic tipped spear to his side as he always did when on duty. Though he didn’t watch the events that unfolded before him the audio told all the details that he’d ever require. Even then he did not yield.

It was not that the soldier agreed with the methods at work – nor would he personally condone them in any way – but years of training and every waking moment he’d lived through since birth had taught him the weak die while the strong prevail. The Commander knew this. It was etched into his very being. He had endured this fact and embraced it head on. That was how he gained his rank. That was the way of the Galra.

Perhaps, had his upbringing not been one of traditional Galran heritage he might have been accustomed to such emotions as ‘sympathy’ and ‘sorrow’. Perhaps then he might have even felt some of those things towards this human boy now. The thought dwelled in the Galran’s mind for a short while as it usually did whenever he encounter the more sensitive species of prisoners that came here, though he banished such dwellings fast as they did not belong in the mind of a Galran warrior. They would make him weak and weakness was not an option.

Victory or death. Strength and triumph, or weakness and failure.

Right now, no matter how strong he may have been once before, the prisoner before him was weak to his opponents that had lashed him to the cell’s table. Therefore, he would soon fail. He would cease to exist and die as all weak things did within Galran territory. By the looks of it he was half-way there already.

When the two soldiers from the battleship had first dragged the boy in the Commander had noted the condition of his body with a trained eye on impulse. He would do so for all who entered this command and this prisoner was no different. Yet despite all the wounds and discolouration that he saw the commander couldn’t help but notice that not all of them were Galra inflicted – not magical either for that matter. No, some of those… quite a number in fact, were the type that came from injuring one’s self in a fight.

The commander knew because he’d done the same to himself many times before on his way to victory.

Back then, at that moment, the Commander though the boy might actually last quite a while here unlike most of their imports.

Now though…

Now he looked mostly dead already.

His sheer silence alone had made the Commander break his usual composure and actually look at the scene before him. If it weren’t for the liquid spilling slowly down his temples and leaving wet tracks across the pale skin the Commander might have suggested they take him to disposal.

The prisoner was broken. He was numb to external stimuli. He was so broken he couldn’t even feel what they were doing to his body, nor was his breathing fully regular. The commander didn’t have to even see the human’s eyes to know he was giving in.

_‘Once they break there’s no bringing them back...’_

“We’re done for now. Take him to a cell and clean this room.”

The Commander snapped to attention and saluted the Witch’s orders as she strode past him, out of the interrogation cell with all but one Druid. Then he permitted himself to ease and approached the prisoner, setting to work at unfastening the cuffs, surprisingly grateful that the boy's attendees had covered his human’s eyes with a thin rag of cloth to conceal what could no longer see.

 

* * *

 

 Keith buried his presence in the shadow of a level five clearance overhang.

He was close now. So very close. If he had followed the holographic maze of a Galran base correctly (and he was certain he had), then as soon as he passed through this solid metal door he would be in the interrogation block.

The only problem was he couldn’t get in.

At first he’d watched a Druid pass through – the only one to cross the doorway in half a varga now – and what little of the block Keith had managed to glimpse was far from hope inducing. Beyond the threshold there had been roughly four Galran solders and a dozen sentries within intital line of sight. Nothing of significant notice. Difficult but not impossible to slip past. However aside from them the block had been crawling with Druids, gliding soundlessly between rooms, some empty handed while others carried crude looking instruments and grotesque vials of… it looked like puke. Keith wrinkled his nose behind his mask.

In the mere half a dobash the door had been open the young Blade had seen all he needed to know that he wasn’t getting in there. Not as he was now anyway.

It took him the remaining quarter of a varga to come up with the solution he was now perusing as he stalked the shadows of a corridor three turns from the interrogation block entrance. Pretty much a _whole 15 Earth minutes_ and the very idea of that made Keith want to slap himself into oblivion because Lance was in there and while he just idly mooched around thinking up ideas to overcome this obstacle his friend was suffering in there.

The masked infiltrator flung himself into a crouch as movement in a lit room to his right caught his eye. Slowly, keeping his back pressed against the wall he extended his right arm, rotating his wrist slowly until the unclad aluminium ring of his holographic viewer caught the clinical lighting of the room and revealed two sentries inside with their backs to the door. They were accompanied by one Galran soldier who appeared to be shifting items around the room.

Keith ground his teeth together as his mind reeled, attempting to strategise his next move within ten ticks but he gave up on three and barged in anyway because he had never been very good at strategising. He worked best on impulse and right now his impulsive quality might just be worth ever second if it meant getting to Lance quicker.

So he moved like the assassin the Blade had trained him to be, eliminating the first sentry before the door had fully retracted to grant him entrance. By the time the metallic shell had clattered to the floor his knife was already protruding from the empty chest of the second one. The sound had drawn the remaining soldier’s attention and Keith moved like a shadow chasing the light, crossing the distance left between him and his opponent at an incredible speed.

He wasn’t fast enough though.

The soldier had drawn his blade and it met the Luxite edge before it got to strike its target. The soldier’s shock vanished then, replaced by a bloodthirsty sneer that made Keith both sick and want to rip him apart at the same time. The young Blade used his weapon’s edge to push away, gaining enough distance to launch another attack and several more attempts were made following that. The pair swung and parried each other’s blow: one with brute like strength and the other twisting and turning like a dancer in motion. A very aggressive motion.

The brute overpowered the smaller fighter in strength but Keith was quicker. Much quicker.

He saw his opening and he took it.

Dodging a heavy blow by swiftly angling his body the young Blade darted into the opening, plunging his knife’s tip into the extended underarm of the soldier where the armour was virtually non-existent. Then he waited a tick to ensure that his last strike would be enough before withdrawing his blade and stepping back to let gravity claim his opponent’s dying body.

Ensuring the Galra did in fact fall and succumbed to death Keith turned away, wiping the bloodied edge of his knife on his suit and setting to work on ripping out the electronics of the first, beheaded sentry.

After ten dobashes, a shocking stream of unuttered curses and more packing out that he would ever admit to anyone, Keith was finally leaving the room inside the body of a sentry.

This was an awful idea.

Then he nearly fell over completely as he left the doorway and this time a curse left his lips for real.

This was the _worst_ idea he’d ever had.

He walked (or rather shuffled awkwardly to begin with) back towards the interrogation block entrance, rapidly trying to adjust to the excessively long arms and legs of the sentry’s shell that were generously packed out with demolished electronic parts and the hands and feet of the second sentry he’d shutdown, all to account for his own lack of stature. At first progress was agonisingly slow as he adjusted to the pinhole vision from the upper chest of the body. Navigating from the sentry head would have been preferable but shamefully no amount of time-limited alterations could get him up that high.

Despite how shoddy his disguise was he was one less problem down. With each gradually more stable step he took Keith’s mind flew over possibilities of how he was going to overcome the level five clearance. Then how to progress once his was inside. That was when the thought hit him like a knife to the gut: what if when he got to Lance he couldn’t get him? What if him trying would put Lance in danger? What if he just had to wait _knowing_ his friend was inside there suffering at the claws of those savages? There was a good chance that even if he got to the right cell he wouldn’t be able to safely retrieve Lance until they were done with him and-

The young blade was just about to round the corner to the interrogation block entrance, gun held in arms that didn’t belong to him, when he noticed the door was already open. Two Galran’s had already crossed it, led by a druid with a limp figure secured between them.

Keith stopped breathing then.

He hadn’t even realised he’d done it as his eyes noticed the limp figure in a heartbeat.

Looking at Lance now he wasn’t even sure he was alive.

Keith’s thought nearly plunged into hell at that until his critical mind forced him to look closer: to analyse the situation. Even though the corridors were dimly lit, significantly impeding visibility levels for him, he still managed to register the cuffs on the wrists and electrified shackles at his ankles.

You don’t keep restraints on dead prisoners.

Keith swallowed. Hard. Then he started to follow at a distance he thought might thaw his patience entirely.

He wanted to lunge at the Galran bastards and rip their throats out for what they'd done but he couldn't. Not until Lance was safe. He would be at risk right now in their clutches. 

So he just followed. 

_'Hand in their Lance. Please just hang in there. I'm coming for you, I promise.'_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well damn, I knew this would happen. I just knew it. One moment I'm writing reasonably short, manageable chapters then BAM. It nearly doubles in size because I have literally no self control with word count when I am writing stuff. I suppose that is kind of ironic since this one was incredibly difficult for me to write. I can't say I'm perfectly happy with it now but after rewriting parts several times already I though it would be best to leave it alone in case I was doing more harm than good.
> 
> Any whoo, once again a massive thank you to everyone who has left kudos and comments! I really appreciate it and it is so lovely to read your thoughts and ideas ^^ 
> 
> Also thank you so much to everyone who has taken the time to read this work so far, even if you only dropped by and decided it wasn't for you I still really appreciate you giving it a shot so thank you for that. 
> 
> I have a mountain of upcoming deadlines so I'm not too sure if the next chapter will be up in a week but I'll get working on it and have it out as soon as possible. 
> 
> Until next time...


	4. With Me Now

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Keith rids himself of a poor disguise only to have it replaced by the horrors wrought upon his friend that he'll wear forever...

Keith had tracked the Galran soldiers dragging Lance to the cell door.

He’d watched them throw him in.

He’d unwillingly waited a full half varga for the druid to leave and then another 8 dobashes for the block soldier to vanish beyond the corner. Presumably he’d departed to commence a patrol of the block but Keith didn’t care. He was left only with the other sentry that had been posted next to him, “guarding” the cell of an unconscious Paladin.

The Blade put the remaining sentry out of commission and shoddily left it propped up against the wall, alongside his own disguise which he’d managed to shed with an impressive amount of gracelessness. This way, at a distance, they might at least look like they were still active.

All of this Keith did with anger rapidly rising in his body and by the time he’d swiped the pad to open the cell door it had manifested into a rage that could rival the Galran Empire. The way these brutes – these beasts – had handled his friend set light to a fire inside him that wanted to turn the bones of his captors to ashes.

Lance was an arsehole – granted. He was annoying, never shut up and literally didn’t know when to back off but even Keith knew nothing Lance was capable of could warrant such harsh treatment, even for a prisoner. Keith should know. He had been at the receiving end of the Sharpshooter’s full brunt of jokes and accusations for well over a year now. He was also certain that Lance would have provoked his captors because that guy never did know when to seal his lips, but even then – even considering his captors were the Galra – that should not have lead to this scale of abuse. Not for Lance. Not for anyone.

Or should it? Before that question never would have hit him but right now all Keith knew was that if a Galran soldier passed him now he’d happily throw him in a cell and let him be subject to the sickening treatment they’d been dishing out.

The rage consumed his heart filed by a new fear. Did…Did Shiro get treated this way to?

That last uncontained through snapped something in the young Blade and he gritted his teeth hard, until the aching pain of the pressure nibbled its way to his brain while he attempted to contain it.

It wasn’t working.

As he passed the threshold into the cell he clenched his fist ready to hit something. Anything. A wall maybe? If he didn’t release it soon he thought he might actually scream.

Then his eyes found Lance and he felt nothing.

The anger fled so fast it might never have even existed and a numb blanket covered him completely, paralysing him to the spot with wide eyes and a slack jaw.

Two metres in front of him lay a boy – no, a young man – laying on his side on the cold metal floor with his legs drawn halfway up to his chest in an almost fatal-like position. Like a young child does when they’re trying to hide from the daemons lurking under their bed. Except this one didn’t make it to the bed, he’d just remained where he’d last been shoved by the cruel hands that had thrown him there.  

The figures limbs were now unshackled, revealing bloodied marks where the cuffs had ripped away the skin until there was barely any left and the black suit covering the body was so torn it would be better suited in a trash can. There was half a hole in the right shin where there should have been muscle and angry red lines cut through the pale canvas of his back.

One hand clutched loosely at his stomach concealing something Keith didn’t even dare to think about and _shit_. The rips in the black suit at his ribs showed skin pulled unnaturally tight against bone, not drastically enough to be life threatening yet enough so that you could tell, plain as day, the body was feeding of muscle to survive. Cut cheekbones conformed to the same appearance, casting dark shadows over little hollows where there should have been pinkish skin. The only skin that showed now was deathly pale and a small army of cuts and grazes littered the curled body between blackened-blue blotches.

Keith didn’t release he was swaying then until he had to grab the doorway with his right hand just to keep himself upright. He hadn’t realised he’d stopped breathing either until he had to force air into his lungs, gasping silently when it filled him. Sickness churned at his stomach and bile rose in his throat. His only free hand flew to his mouth while he fought to swallow it down.

When the door had opened he knew not to expect anything great but this… this was a work of evil.

This was not okay.

He wasn’t okay.

If he hadn’t know this was Lance Keith doubts he would have even recognised him.

Lance was tall, lean, overconfident and full of life. He’d bound between the members on the bridge hurling out his greatest chat up lines and insults devoted designed specifically for “the mullet” like it depended on his life.

What lay before Keith was none of that. It was a mere shadow of a human simply existing.

Shaking all thoughts from his head Keith forced himself to walk forwards, his footing unsteady as he moved to crouch jerkily by Lance’s side. Reaching out he gently shook his shoulder, attempting to wake his ex-teammate but the boy refused to stir.

Hearing a sound in echo into the pin drop silence the young Blade’s head snapped up towards the door, his body stilling as he waited thirty ticks, daring a noise to break the silence once more and also praying it wouldn’t.

When no more noise came he looked back down at the limp body beneath his hand and shook him again, more violently than he’d have liked to this time.

As no response came Keith’s eyes wandered up to the bandage wrapped around Lance’s head, knotted at the back and concealing his eyes at the front. What an absurd excuse for a blindfold that was. Reaching up he moved to pull it away when a low groan broke the silence and the Sharpshooter stirred into the consciousness. The young Blade jumped, withdrawing his hand fast and just glaring at Lance, not missing the lines of pain that were etched onto his face as his woke.

Keith opened his mouth to speak but no words came. The air lodged in his throat making him want to choke. Swallowing hard he tried again, cursing how quiet and uncertain his voice sounded when it softly passed his lips.

“Lance?”

Instant regret filled the young Blade as the Sharpshooter visibly stiffened beneath him. It was as if his body had acted on instinct, automatically preparing for the pain it expected to come.

“Lance…it’s me… Keith?”

Lance didn’t react and it hurt more than Keith would admit. His ex-teammate didn’t even so much as twitch.

“Lance, are you awake?”

Silence.

Keith paused in his attempts, unsure of how to proceed. Concern dug deep into his bones. He hadn’t expected such a lack of response from someone so…

“Lance come on. We’ve got to move now.”

A sound echoed down the prison block halls from outside the cell door, causing an untouched cup of water by the doorway to shimmer.

Keith doubled his efforts.

“Come on Lance. Get. Up.”

The Sharpshooter didn’t move. His breaths came a little faster and the hand holding his stomach tightened but he didn’t even attempt to move his head to the sound of Keith’s voice.

The sound outside came again and Keith made up his mind.

Trying his best to ignore the way Lance tensed against him, he slipped an arm under the Sharpshooter’s arms and held him gently but firmly at the waist. In one swift movement his other hand secured one of the Paladin’s limp arms over his shoulders. The young Blade held the abused limb just above the wrist, trying his best to avoid the bloodied ring left behind by the bites of an unpadded cuff.

“We need to move now.”

The dead weight in his grasp didn’t move.

“Lance, move. Now. I swear I’ll kick your ass into a wormhole if you don’t move _now_!” He growled, keeping his voice a low as possible. “I’ll-“

He paused, fighting back his urgency induced frustration and beating his emotions into submission. Softly, he tried again, his voice betraying him by cracking slightly:

“Please Lance. I can’t carry you alone. Walk with me…please?”

Nothing.

Then, just when Keith was about to give up on asking and just attempt to haul his ex-teammate out of here alone, Lance moved. Gradually the weight in Keith’s arms shifted and decrease (not that it was much to begin with anyway but the other’s height made it awkward to support him alone). One bare foot left the floor and Keith moved his armoured boot with it as Lance took an unsteady step forward.

The noise outside came again. Far away still but closer this time.

“That’s it Lance, come on. Work with me now.”

Lance moved again, this time falling into Keith’s side as his right foot failed to bare the same weight as the left. The young Blade braced himself and let it happen before tugging lightly on the arm over his shoulders and the thin waist in his hand, urging the wavering form forwards again.

Together they moved, painfully slow by Keith’s standards, but one step at a time they moved. Keith scouted the corridor when they reached the cell entrance. Ensuring it was clear he half walked, half pulled Lance outside and sealed the door.

The sound came from the right, providing the Blade with a direction to the treat. It was closer now. Too close. So Keith moved left and urged Lance to move faster, biting back the guilt as he felt him struggle immensely in his arms.

Keith forced the feeling down with a vengeance.

Emotions would have to wait. He had to move fast now if he wanted to get Lance out of here.

He _had_ to get Lance out of here.

The sound moved closer still and the Blade pulled harder at the weight on his right until they rounded a corner. Within a half tick he’d shoved them both back first into the wall, falling flat against it while Lance caught his breath and Keith strained his hearing to identify the Galra soldier that had gone on patrol rounding the far-right corner they’d just fled from.

This wasn’t good. They would have to move again – now - in order to put as much distance between them and the patrol before the soldier noticed the sentries weren’t active anymore.

Pushing off from the wall he silently coaxed Lance into moving again, keeping to the shadows and heading for the block exit without uttering a word. Speech was a luxury he could risk. Not now. Not if he wanted to get them both out alive.

 

* * *

 

 

It was only once Keith finally reached the exit of the Galra’s tortuously complex maze of corridors that he noticed they were leaving behind an oddly distributed trail of blood from Lance’s mangled foot. Adjusting his grip slightly around the Sharpshooter’s waist the Blade looked down to inspect the damage and felt a pang of guilt for making him walk on it. What he saw was far from good and wrenched at his gut. The newly scabbed over wound had cracked open and widened in the effort to repeatedly put weight on it. Keith frowned at the wound and looked away, making a mental note to try and take more of Lance’s weight when they continued.

Feeling the wounded Paladin slump against him and drawing in ragged breaths, Keith took the moment of respite to peer past the metallic threshold they were perched against and through the open door. With trained eyes he critically scanned the area beyond.

This wasn’t the door he’d come in through, that he was sure off. This exit was much too small for any cargo to be hauled through and the slope ahead of them lead out onto an open platform at ground level, housing a dozen or so ground reconnaissance vehicles in charging bays. Each one had four, dual bladed fans and a two-person seat: one for the driver and another on the back with what appeared to be a small lazer gun for mid-ranged combat. Overall it wasn’t that different to a hovercraft adaption of a quadbike back home… that was, if you could look past the almost scorpion like body shape that curled upwards at the rear.

Tearing his gaze from the alien tech Keith narrowed his eyes and scoured the land beyond them. It was nearly pitch-black outside with barely any stars to light the dessert-like terrain that stretched out as far as he could see. Giant sand dunes cast midnight shadows upon the dark grey sands below and a breeze stirred restlessly from the east, sending the top layer of sand from them into small whirls of air that would finally come to rest upon the ground once more. It was like a storm was threatening the whole land, daring it to oppose its generous restraint.

Keith pressed his lips in a hard line behind his mask.

Somewhere he’d made a wrong turn. There were no vehicles with airborne capabilities in sight.

How the hell was he supposed to get Lance off planet now?

As if in response Lance stirred at his side and let out a pained groan. Keith felt him shift in an attempt to take back some of his own weight before failing and slumping what felt like all of his weight into Keith’s body.

So far they had made it through the complex relatively easily. Although progress had been nerve rackingly slow the six Galran soldiers and four sentries that had obstructed their path had been promptly eliminated and stowed into concealment by Keith. In half a varga they had made it from the cells to here and even managed to grab two ratty old cloaks that had probably belongs to druids on their way out.

That particular idea had hit Keith when he’d passed a window sporting his reflection in full Blade of Marmora armour. Although he couldn’t fulfil his mission for them – not anymore anyway – he knew that if he was seen, or worse caught, in his current attire he could risk exposing the entire group to the Empire. The best course of action would have been to ditch the armour but doing that in the middle of a Galra ground base wasn’t exactly an option and he’d have been lying to himself if he thought he’d feel as safe without the protection. Therefore, his next option had been to simply conceal it and succeed in not being caught (which was definitely easier said than implemented).

So far, the journey since retrieving Lance had be uncannily quiet and the young Blade counted his lucky stars that the patrol back at the cell was either the most unintellectual Galra being he’d come across so far or had not yet passed Lance’s cell to see the deactivated Sentries, most likely in favour of lounging in the crew room several meters before it.

Either way though they would have to backtrack now or they might never get off-planet.

Burying his guilt Keith shook the Blue Paladin back to the land of the living with only weak grunts of protest and readjusted his grip on the undernourished frame now haphazardly wrapped in a ragged old cloak. Pulling his own hood further over his mask, the Blade turned to return to the inside of the complex.

Then the siren sounded.

Four sets of footsteps marched somewhere nearby on the base interior at a steady jog and Keith cursed. Turning rapidly with Lance and forcing him into run the pair dove out into the foreign world before him.

Keith moved fast, practically dragging  Lance along with him as he took a sharp right once outside, heading for the direction he could only pray the airborne craft platform was in. Somewhere beside him the wounded Paladin gasped in surprise (or pain, Keith could no longer really tell) but the siren’s howls buried all other sounds that might have followed.

The omnipotent whining of the siren pounded at his ears, screaming at him to move and foreshadowing the promise of pain upon capture if he failed to move fast enough.

Together they ran, Lance now seemingly fully awake as he trailed behind Keith who pulled him by the hand and forced his awkward limp into a speedy stride. They passed grate structures, tankers, and supply replenishment pods, pelting around the outside of the complex and crossing numerous circular platforms. Each stride they took carried them around the giant structure in search of aircraft.

Just when Keith was giving up hope he saw it and grinded them both to a halt.

Around thirty winged pods sat upon a holding platform.

Thirty little angels that were going to get them out of here.

He moved.

Then a floodlight brighter than the moon slapped him in the face and nearly sent him stumbling backwards into a swaying Lance.

“Eyes on the target. We have a visual.”

“All soldiers to the East Platform, Delta Five. Repeat – “

Keith didn’t wait for repeat. He didn’t wait for the voice that echoed over the platform, amplified by the Galran equivalent of a tannoy system. He was already turning and running back the way they had come, cursing venomously under his breath as a small shield sprung to life around each airborne vehicle, securing it off from any outsiders.

He could hear the hordes of marching soldiers covering the ground between them and their target and Keith forced his legs to move faster, tugging not-so-gently at Lance’s abused wrist in a desperate attempt to get him to pick up the pace.

They were falling behind now. The young Blade could hear it in how their footsteps started to lag while the Galran stomping grew ever closer, even audible over Lance’s wheezing gasps as he fought for air that didn’t seem to cooperate. In that fleeting moment Keith though the Paladin might actually have a heart attack.

Suddenly the weight in the Blade’s hand increased substantially and yanked him to a dead stop. Eyes wide he turned to look behind him, just in time to see Lance all but crumbled to his knees, falling on his one free hand and gasping uncontrollably.

Violet eyes danced wildly as Keith scanned the area for another way out.

There had to be one.

They couldn’t be caught now.

Lance would –

_He would die._

The cogs in his head burned to life when the young Blade noticed where they were. His eyes recognised the replenishment bay first and then straining off to their left he could see them.

The harsh terrain reconnaissance vehicles.

If they could make it, if Keith chose this option, it would mean potentially stranding them on a foreign planet with no way off.

It would mean sealing off Lance’s route to medical aid, which he was in desperate need of.

They would likely get captured fleeing into a desert he had no baring in.

It was their only option.

Swinging back around and crouching to Lance’s level, Keith retracted his mask and mentally forced out the ungodly wailing of the siren. Banishing the footsteps that were all too close to them now he focused solely on the fallen Paladin before him.

“Lance. Lance listen to me.”

A cough racked the Sharpshooter’s body between shuddering gulps of air.

“Lance you have to get up. We have to move now!”

He swayed dangerously where he’d fallen, head angled downwards towards the ground.

“Please Lance, just a little further. I promise…I promise I’ll get you out of here but you have to get up _NOW_!”

Hesitantly, Lance’s head moved upwards to the direction of Keith’s voice, his eyes locked behind that ratty old bandage and Keith wasted no time in taking that as his answer. Swiftly he began sliding an arm under the wounded Paladin’s shoulder and hurling him back up onto his feet.

A pained sound left cracked lips.

“Come on Lance. Come on…”

The footsteps were like drums in his ears now and he could see the soldiers only about forty meters out as they rounded the corner into sight.

“Come on Lance, move with me now…”

He pulled the weight into his armoured arms and forced them both forwards.

“Run, we have to run!”

Then they picked up the pace and beyond all belief Lance actually _ran_. He ran in the support of Keith’s arms faster that he had ever managed yet and Keith mentally blessed whatever being granted his friend such unyielding willpower.

Together they closed their distance from the nearest hovercraft.

Together they worked to outrun their enemy.

Together they reached the craft and Keith practically shoved Lance onto the seat, lifting the Paladin in his arms and noticing for the first time how sickeningly light the Sharpshooter was. In another time, under significantly less pressure, Keith might have actually lost himself as he marvelled over the purity of Lance’s sheer determination despite all the pain it must be causing him, but right now the only though that dominated Keith’s mind outside of how light he had been was the urgency of getting off the platform.

Swinging himself into the seat behind Lance, the young Blade pressed his body as close to the Paladin as he could in an attempt to secure him between the bars of the craft and himself. Reaching around the Sharpshooter’s sides he grasped the handles and buried the small panic that rose in the absence of knowledge on how to actually work this thing.

In a split second he let his instinct override him and the craft burst to life, rising from the ground by a full meter and tearing out of the charging bay just as the nearest soldiers had approached. The changing cable snapped away from the vehicle and coiled wildly in their wake, knocking out at least four unsuspecting soldiers while Keith and Lance soared into the dessert wilderness that stretched out before them, putting as much distance between them and the Galra base as they could.

_“Hang on Lance, hang in there…”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well damn that was a tough one. Apologies it is a little shorter but I wanted to get this one out to you guys asap and it felt like this was a good place to break from the Chapter. 
> 
> Finally, thank you so much for all the comments. I am quite LITERALLY speechless at the response to this fanfic so far and you guy have given me a confidence in my writing that I've never really had. I know it isn't perfect but I am working on it and your responses to this work have really helped to push me through this Chapter in between a ton of uni work. 
> 
> As always, a huge THANK YOU to everyone who has left Kudos, comment, subscribed, bookmarked or even just given this fanfic a read. You guys are awesome. 
> 
> Until next time...


	5. Dare To Believe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance is plagued by another illusion that seems all too real while Keith continues his attempt to secure their freedom.

Lance didn’t remember anything after the world flickered into an everlasting darkness. He heard the Witch and her Druids working but all noise that hit his ears was never really registered by his brain. It failed to penetrate the loud ringing that hummed on in the back of his mind while his conscious being shut down completely, numbed by the fear that consumed him.

He doesn’t recall anything after the light left his eyes. He doesn’t even remember being returned to a cell. When he was ruthlessly tossed into the cold metal interior he hit the floor hard, landing on his weaker side and embracing the pain that flared through his body. No sound left his lips save for the whisper of air rushing from his lungs, and somewhere in a darker part of his broken mind the Sharpshooter dared to hope that the pain this rough treatment brought him might kill him.

Sharpshooter.

That was his name given to him by his comrades… no, the nickname he’d given himself. Everyone had laughed at first. Keith had even asked him if he was serious which stung a little. Lance remembered the first time someone actually called him it though. It was a memory that had brought him overwhelming joy: a memory that reminded him that maybe he could be useful to the team after all. Shiro had been the first to call him it, right after saving an extremely paranoid Sloth. The nickname had stuck with him after that. Though it was rarely used, when someone did use it the memory would leave the Blue Paladin on an emotional high for days afterwards.

The idea of being the team’s Sharpshooter had sparked a new determination in Lance. Since the first time Shiro called him it the Blue Paladin had piled an incredible amount of time and focus into homing in on his newfound skill, in the hope that he could better apply himself in a fight. His team were relying on his Sharpshooting skill and he was not about to let them down when they needed him the most.

It was his “thing”.

Since then he’d become a valuable asset to the Paladin team, even managing to save his friends from a few less desirable situations out in the field. Sometimes, very rarely, his thoughts would try to persuade him that his Sharpshooting quality was perhaps the only reason he was worthy of being a Paladin. These cruel ideas would catch him out when he was alone and try to corner him but every time they attacked Lance would fight them back with pride. A pride he’d gained through his comrade’s admiration of his Sharpshooting. Granted those negative thoughts were probably right but he didn’t care because he was their Sharpshooter now and even if that was the only reason he was useful to his team he vowed to uphold his nickname and help them in any way he could.

Now he couldn’t see though.

Now he was blind.

He couldn’t be their Sharpshooter anymore.

He would never be able to help his friends again.

Sharpshooter was dead.

He couldn’t be useful to them anymore.

The thought strangled him and Lance curled in on himself, a barely audible whimper escaping his lips as salty, wet tears fell past the rag concealing sightless eyes. Their clear trail streaked down his deathly pale face and died where they tumbled to the floor, shattering as quickly as his place in the world had.

The broken Paladin’s knees nearly reached his chest where he lay discarded on his side and his cried, letting the reality crush him like an insignificant spec of light in the darkness. It snuffed out his poor excuse of a flame that remained as he wept, an endless string of apologies to his friends coursing through his mind but never leaving his lips. He wanted to apologise to them for losing the only good quality he contributed to their team. He wanted to apologies for all the trouble his capture must have caused them. He wanted to apologise for leaving the team one member shot all this time and his heart wrenched at itself in his chest when he thought of how they might have struggled so far without him.

Lance wanted all of this, but more than anything he just hoped they’d given up on him.

He didn’t want them to come anymore. He didn’t want them to rescue him because he didn’t want them to see what he’d become. If they saw him now they’d realise just how useless he actually was. That though hurt more than anything the Galra Empire could ever do to him.

It _hurt._

It hurt so, _so_ much…

Lance let it squeeze his heart until he couldn’t breathe, silently crying until he had no more tears left to give. At that moment the darkness rose to meet him and he willingly passed himself over to the unconsciousness, praying with all the life left in him that this time it would choose to keep him.

_I’m sorry… I’m so, so sorry…_

 

* * *

 

 

The darkness doesn’t keep him.

Lance reluctantly crawls back to a semi-conscious state that shrouds him in pain and clouds his mind as he wakes.

No, not wakes up.

Someone has woken him up. There is a hand on his shoulder.

Instinctively Lance’s whole body tenses without him realising it, waiting for the sharp bolt of a stun gun to hit him for not waking up fast enough. His breath catches in his lungs and holds as he waits for the pain to strike him. Only the pain never does comes.

There’s something strange about the hand too. Its weight is too light on his shoulder and the touch is far too gentle.

Behind the tatty cloth he opens his eyes and the recollection of losing his sight knifes him in the gut ruthlessly. The most recent past events send his body into a stark numbness and he closes his eyes again, silently begging the darkness to take him back once more.

Somewhere at his side there is a noise and Lance becomes vaguely aware that somebody is talking but he can’t quite make out what they’re saying. Or rather he just didn’t care anymore. He just wanted to sleep. He just wanted to go back to feeling nothing.

But the darkness didn’t want him back.

Finally giving in, Lance settled for waiting for whatever this person touching him had planned.

Then something struck him as he listened to the mumble of the voice nearby. It seemed oddly familiar and… panicked maybe? They were trying to be quiet whoever they were and Lance couldn’t piece that together. It just didn’t make sense. Why would the Galra, or Druids for that matter, need to be quiet in their own base?

“Lan…me on… we…ov…now.”

Lance’s heart jumped painfully in his chest, causing his breathing to become erratic which in turn attacked his wounded side. Shakily he raised a hand to cover the wound, as if that alone might ease the hurt.  

He knew that voice.

Slowly the world came into focus. The voice was almost crystal clear now.

It filled his heart with a fleeting hope.

“…on Lance. Get.Up.”

Then dread came crashing down on him and fear flooded his heart.

No.

_No no no no no…_

He can’t. He wouldn’t. He can’t be here. This isn’t real. A hallucination. Just another cruel mind trick.

Suddenly there were arms gripping at his aching limps and pulling him up onto his feet while he gasped in shock. A slight tremor of fear racked his body from head to foot. The point between laying on his side and somehow reaching standing position was missing from his mind, replaced by the incredible amount of new pain it had awoken from so many wounded parts of him he couldn’t even pinpoint them all anymore.

“Lance, move. Now. I swear I’ll kick your ass into a wormhole if you don’t move  _now_!”

Somehow that ceased all train of thought in Lance’s disoriented mind.

One of Haggar’s illusions had never threated him before.

This one was more real. It was too much like the original. It was too much like _him_.

“Please Lance. I can’t carry you alone. Walk with me…please?”

Those words broke all reasoning that had manifested inside Lance. They shoved it to the back of his mind and suddenly the broken Paladin dared himself to believe that maybe, just maybe…could this be real?

There was a strong arm holding him up at the waist and another at his arm, supporting him fully. They didn’t discard him. They didn’t push him away to the ground. They just held him.

So he trusted them.

Slowly, swallowing his pain, Lance attempted to take back some of his own weight, favouring his left side. Shaking he lifted his right foot and hesitantly placed it a little in front of his left. The effort sent sharp tremors of agony soaring through his injured limb until his head hurt. Lance nearly fell then, he felt his right knee buckle and poured all his strength into reinforcing it, willing it not to give and fighting to keep supporting what little of his weight he currently held.

It was excruciating.

Lance wanted so badly to give up.

“That’s it Lance, come on. Work with me now.”

Somewhere beside him that familiar voice was taking a step forwards and all thoughts of giving up vanished from his mind.

The voice was so unusually desperate, so believing.

It believed.

It believed in him.

So Lance forced himself past the searing pain that tore through him and moved, daring more strongly now to believe this wasn’t just an illusion.

Daring to believe it was _real_.

If this was real…if the Keith that held him was real…then there was no way in hell Lance was going to give up so easily. He will give everything he had left to follow him one last time.

 

* * *

 

 

Lance doesn’t remember making it through the complex.

He doesn’t remember making it outside.

He doesn’t even remember when the siren first sounded until it slowly crawled into his consciousness, past the overwhelming agony that closed his mind of from all external stimuli. Pain had washed out the ability to feel anything else and eventually Lance couldn’t even fight past it to focus of the hand at his waist or the weight holding his arm across sturdy shoulders.

It was excruciating. It was like a carving knife was ripping at his ligaments, the bones in his right foot cried out in agony, his insides were screaming and his lungs burned under the inferno of exertion.

That was the scariest part – his lungs. Lance had been fighting with them to work since they’d first started walking. Now they were running and his grip on control over them was failing to force the organs into submission. Air ripped past his throat and left just as viciously to the point where he felt as though the inside of his throat was bleeding.

He couldn’t _breathe._

He couldn’t… the air…

There wasn’t enough air.

Not for the first time Lance’s head swirled dangerously in the place of no vision and he was vaguely aware that he was falling. His broken body pulled at the hand now holding his wrist and he was distantly aware of the sharp jolt impacting the ground sent through him.

Lance’s sole focus was on breathing.

Or trying to.

He couldn’t…his body…

No.

It _couldn’t_ shut down now.

It wasn’t _allowed_ to.

The voice was back. It lingered close by him and he felt a presence in front of him.

It was speaking. Saying something he couldn’t quite hear past the thundering in his eardrums.

Lance’s mind tittered on the edge of consciousness and for the first time in ages he tried to fight it.

He didn’t want to go back to the darkness.

“Plea…ance…furth…I promise…get you o…NOW!”

Then he was up. Lance was back on his feet, his entire weight in someone else’s arms and the darkness still nibbling at the edges of his consciousness.

“Run, we have to run!”

Lance hung onto those words. They shone in his mind so crystal clear that he found it hard to believe the siren and pounding of footsteps behind them existed anymore. The Blue Paladin used them to banish all remnants of darkness from his mind and then he followed their request.

Lance started running.

He ran, heavily supported by the one at his side.

He forced that cursed air into his lungs, fuelled by adrenaline alone and some absurd need to just obey those words.

Not because of the words themselves, but because of who had spoken them.

It was an order and a request in one, coming from one of the few people in the whole universe he could trust wholeheartedly.

So forced himself to run, even if it threatened to kill him.

 

* * *

 

At some point he’d been lifted onto a padded seat of some sort and his right foot in particular had screamed in relief.

Lance had felt the added weight settle behind him and he whipped his bandaged head around to face the direction that the heavy footfalls were coming from.

He wishes he could see.

He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t scared. Not being able to see what was happening was nothing short of terrifying.

After what felt like an eternity the thing he was sat on roared to life and lifted, physically making Lance jump as he hadn’t expected his seat to move.

Then they were moving, lurching forwards and away from the chaos of noises and wailing siren which had soon became lost in the distance behind them.

The cool wind lapped at his face and tussled his hair.  Lance indulged in this long-forgotten feeling, focusing on the fresh air that filled his lungs as his breath evened out, and how it caressed his burning limbs. The pain slowly eased a little and a dull throbbing beat inside his head.

This…felt familiar.

It reminded him of something.

How odd it was for such a pointless memory to strike him now.

It reminded Lance of his last night on Earth. Back home. Back when he’d just intercepted a Mullet from saving Shiro. They had all piled onto Keith’s two-person hoverbike then and raced the Garrison for their freedom. Lance had though he was going to die. He regretted, for the first time in his live, never having made a will. If ever he’d feared someone’s driving before it would have been Keith’s.

_Did that guy even feel fear?_

It was so strange to think of that memory now. Lance had completely forgotten that little detail.

Still, he welcomed the familiarity of it.

Slowly darkness tugged at his consciousness once again and Lance just didn’t have the strength to resist it this time.

Closing his sightless eyes behind the rag he allowed his mind to rest, his body leaning back into his the one behind him as they soared through the breeze. All was quiet except for the continuous droning of the vehicle’s motor.

Safe.

He felt safe.

 

* * *

 

The grey desert sand roared to life in the wake of the hovercraft as it soared above its surface and disturbed its midnight slumber. In the wake of the vehicles path it took to the air with enough velocity to shred flower petals, that is, if they could grow in the barren wasteland that stretched on for miles. No plant life came out of the night’s shadows and no obstacles aside from the giant sand dunes presented themselves to the two humans fleeing atop the bike at neck-break speed.

Keith leaned a little closer over the handles of his bike to ensure Lance was secure between his arms as he forced to bike to maintain full speed. Lance had fallen unconscious a while ago now, Keith had felt him lean into him fully and watched his head roll off to the side slightly. The wind had threated to claim the cloak hooked over his gaunt shoulders then and Keith had dropped speed only for a tick to trap a corner of it under his thigh before rotating the bike handle to pick up the pace once more.

It had been almost a full two varga since the Blade had left the blaring sirens and skyscraper of a base behind them both. Since then he hadn’t seen or heard anything that could insinuate the Galra following them.

They would be though.

He had seen the armoured purple specs flocking to the remaining land craft before they had fully vanished into the distance.

Keith knew if he slowed or stopped now then whatever dispatch was following would catch them within a few dobashes…maybe less, maybe more depending on how well they’d managed to track them across a dessert. This current environment was both a blessing and a curse. It would make tracking one rouge hover bike difficult for the enemy but it also provided no cover for the hunted. The latter was most concerning. If they didn’t find somewhere they could rest in hiding soon they’d be stranded out in the middle of this wasteland.

Violet eyes flickered down to the holographic control panel glowing a soft blue in the dark before him. The bike had been fast and had a full charge when they had departed. Now the curve of the charge bar was lingering in the lower quarter, giving rise to a greater need for a place undercover. There was no way they would survive on foot in this wasteland. It was borderline cold at the moment but Keith had absolutely no idea if the temperature would drop further still or even if it would heat up come daybreak like the desserts did back home. Visiting so many worlds since leaving Earth had taught him a great many things: one of them being that no two planets ever seemed to fully conform to the laws of his home planet.

Narrowing his eyes against the darkness the young Blade strained them to see as far as he could, his hands have long since grown numb against the gentle resistance of the bike handles which he held at full throttle. He watched the dunes soar past them, growing increasingly more restless as the storm began to unleash pre-emptive bursts of a full blow wrath that would soon hit.

Nearly another varga passed before the bike charge hit the last tenth and the Blade was just beginning to consider the worst when he saw it.

Slowly but surely the land before him changed as the darkness unveiled small structures buried in the grey sands. Angling the bike to pass between them Keith watched them grow in size until a few dobashes later there were full sized frames protruding from their burial site. The ground beneath the bike had grown rockier and rubble was sent flying backwards, occasionally breaking the silence around them when they came into contact with the ruins.

The whole area seemed to be littered with the fallen remains of what might have once been a grand city to the great architects of this planet’s occupants. Whoever they were though defiantly could not be living here anymore. It would have taken an event of colossal magnitude to topple these mighty structures and perhaps a decade or two for the sands to claim this much of their former glory.

Suddenly the bike sounded a power warning as the charge hit the dangerously low mark and Keith knew what he had to do.

Steering the bike a full mile from their current location he found a collapsed building with a hole the size of his old dessert shack blow into it where a part of a wall might have once existed. Outside the entrance the Blade grinded the bike to a halt and scanned his surroundings twice before dismounting carefully, so as not the jog his friend’s injuries anymore than required.

Next, he pulled Lance gently from the seat and lowered him to the ground, propping his back up against the smoothest rumble he could find nearby before returning to the bike. Grasping the handles he pulled the vehicle inside the structure until the darkness of the buildings shadows would come to cover it fully, even one daybreak came. Reaching for his knife he shut all systems down and fiddled with the wires beneath, tracing the line that seemed to lead to the standby power mode LRU and cutting it clean. If the bike had any form of remote beacon for tracking capabilities this would have put them out of commission for good. To be safe though they would need to leave this area and fast.

Stepping back into the shallow moonlight, now half concealed by rolling thunderclouds, Keith knelt by Lance and reached out with a hand to wake him. His hand never made contact though as his eyes fell upon the shredded, bare foot that still trickled blood from its open wounds.

There was no way Lance could walk in this.

He wasn’t even sure if Lance could walk at all right now.

How the hell had he managed to run back there?

Swallowing his guilt, Keith reached out with both arms to grasp Lance’s shoulders and support the rear of his kneecaps carefully. Slowly bracing himself he rose, lifting the horrifyingly light frame into his arms bridle style and keeping the battered body as close to his chest as possible.

After a few ticks the Blade had fully adjusted to the added weight. Walking forwards he carried Lance’s unconscious form back the way they had come for half a mile before slipping from that rough path by around forty-five degrees. Twice Keith had to stop to readjust Lance’s position, switching to supporting his midsection over his right shoulder once, then carrying him bridal style again later on.  Every fifty steps he would slow his brisk pace and thoroughly scan the area for any signs of disturbance. Keith found none, so he pressed on until he came across a fallen structure around a mile and a half from the discarded hover craft.

Standing before it’s entrance he panted softly from the exertion and ran a trained eye over the dark interior, trying to determine whether or not it was safe to enter.

In total the only part of the building itself that remained above ground level was a corner, no larger than a bus, with a hole where what appeared to be broken clear composite had once resided (a window maybe?). Small shards of the clear material remained fixed in the battered framework designed to secure it in place and the inside seemed mostly empty apart from the grey sand that had entered and crept downwards into the interior of the structure. On top of the exterior walls of the protruding corner another structure had shattered and now supported what could pass for another sand dune unless you were practically on top of it.

It wasn’t ideal, but it was all they had for now.

Shifting Lance’s weight in his arms Keith entered the ruin and descended into the darkness within, passing a few support beams still intact. This room must have been pretty large once, perhaps even able to rival the size of the Garrison training room if you counted all of its twists and turns, now half filled with sand.

Detecting no imminent threats and locating an area fully concealed from the entrance Keith lowered Lance to the ground and gently propped his upright against the concrete-like, half-broken wall. Returning to the entrance once more the Blade watched for a full two dobashes, almost daring the Galra soldiers to come plummeting out of the darkness.

Nothing came.

Not even a lump of rubble moved to shatter the silence.

Reassured they were safe – for now at least – Keith returned to Lance, sliding his back down the remnants of the wall until he came to sit beside his friend who current rest with his head slumped forwards in his slumber.

For a moment Keith just listened, his forearms propped against knees half drawn to his chest. He listened to the storm outside, now beginning to unleash its full pent-up fury upon the night, sending grains of sand tearing into nearby structures and dunes alike. He listened to the howling of the wind as it started to whistle more confidently between its obstacles until his own breathing had fully evened out.

Gradually the Blade’s thoughts caught up to him, sending the stark reality of events since leaving the ship crashing into him with a vengeance.

He’d done it.

He had actually done it.

He’d abandoned his mission.

He’d betrayed the respect the Marmora had for him.

He’d found Lance and he had got him out of that hell.

Somehow, against enormous odds he’d lost their pursuers in the process and guaranteed them safety, at least for the night. The storm would ensure that.

Keith shifted slightly then, turning his head to face Lance who rested within inches of him.

He had done all of those things but at an incalculable cost to his friend.

Rolling forwards, he moved into a kneeling position and pulled down his hood, eyes briefly flickering down the prone form of his at his side and coming to rest on the most mangled foot he’d ever seen.

Keith feared that if he didn’t attend to the Sharpshooter’s wounds now then his friend might not be with him come morning.

There was no time to rest yet.

Lance needed him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh wow, I feel like this next chapter is calling for some angst but with Keith included more this time. 
> 
> Thank you so much for all of your comments, kudos and interest in this fanfic so far! You guys are the best. I hope you enjoyed this chapter and I will aim to get another one out to you all as soon as possible. 
> 
> Until next time!!


	6. Seeing the Real You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Keith attempts perhaps his worst field medical aid yet while Lance struggles with himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the huge gap since the last chapter. This past month and a bit (as per usual), has been insanely busy due to a variety of personal commitments. 
> 
> So, with out further ado, here is the next one...

Keith knelt before Lance with his hands outstretched for a full minute while his eyes roamed the unforgivable damage inflicted upon his friend, trying hard to decide rapidly upon which wound to attend to first. His attempts became inevitably caught up in a vicious loop of disbelief. Disbelief that came with viewing the quantity of wounds before him.

Keith felt his stomach churn dangerously.

It wasn’t to do with the blood. It wasn’t to do with the wounds either. He was no stranger to even the most gruesome of bodily harm. He even inflicted it, mostly in self-defense. Gaining such harm had also become a much more frequent occurrence too since joining the Blade of Marmora. So in short, Keith was no stranger to wounds at all.

No. These things he could handle. They didn’t even have an effect on him anymore, not even when he wore them himself.

It was the fact that these wounds weren’t just on anybody.

They were on Lance.

They littered his body as frequently as soapsuds in the shower, their dark inflictions peppering his naturally tanned skin and marks of red splashed into the numerous gaps of the dirty black spacesuit that hung from his frame. Fresh blood glistened in some wounds while dark crimson cracked along the skin of others, sticking the suit in place where it had long since dried.

The absence of cuffs on his wrists and ankles left a mess of chaffed skin in their wake, oozing slightly still where his body’s attempts to blister had been literally ripped apart. A little further up one leg was a familiar tear in the space suit, revealing a half moon shape of the lazer shot that had penetrated the side of the Sharpshooter’s calf. Keith had seen this one happened. He remembered the sight far too well for his liking and his frown deepened in an attempt to focus on the treatment he was now obliged to give, rather than the lurching of his stomach.

None of these belonged here.

None of these belonged on Lance.

For the first time since saving him, Keith felt horror at the sight of his friend so potent that it fully consumed his instinctive rage which would attempt to rise. A rage that would build at the thought of how so many different wounds had been acquired and bubble to the surface in a desire to bring pain to those who dared inflict these wrongs upon his ex-teammate. Though the rage wasn’t there this time.

Making a decision, after far longer than it should have taken, the young Blade’s hands moved towards the most mangled of two bare feet laying lax before him. Forcing them to remain steady, he reached out to tenderly lift it and inspect the damage more closely. Even with the low golden light of his small flashlight he could not see past the bloodied mess.

Reluctantly he reached for his flask, still full from when he had first departed for his mission, and popped the cap before trickling sparing amounts upon the open wound. Tearing a few strips from his own stolen cloak the young Blade dabbed away the dirt and blood as gently as he could.

Keith bit his lip when he realised the wound had opened far enough to flash a glimpse of heelbone.

Cursing he jammed the rag into the wound and held pressure to it, willing the blood to stay in Lance’s body where it belonged. The pounding of his own heart increased as time stretch on for what felt like Vargas before it finally staunched, leaving only a small amount of blood oozing out.

Fetching a clean strip Keith packed the wound and used another from the cloak to secure it in place, wrapping Lance’s entire foot from his toes to just above his ankle where he tied it in place.

None of this was ideal.

None of it was good enough.

Lance needed proper medical treatment: a healing pod, clean gauze, antibacterial gels, creams, disinfected tooling, stitches, painkillers… probably even more blood if he kept losing it at this rate. Yet Keith had none of these, so he continued with what little resources he had at his disposal for now. Though that didn’t stop a steady string of unspoken prayers from playing in his mind. Prayers that he meagre first aid attempts would be enough to keep everything that should be inside a body where it belonged and any infection away from it.

The young Blade cleaned the other foot next and set to work bandaging it while the guilt washed over him like the sea over sand. The damage done to this one had only torn away the surface of the sole but he knew it had been partly his fault for making Lance run on it barefooted. Why the hell hadn’t he found the Sharpshooter some boots before they left the base? Heck, it was a miracle he’d even been able to walk, let alone run!

Next he moved onto the shot wound in his shin, praising whatever heavens were out there when he noticed the heat of the laser appeared to have sealed the wound on impact. A small victory, if you excused the little missing chunk of leg, but no less painful.

Slowly the young Blade made his way up to Lance’s waist, being painstakingly careful with each wound that required attention and subconsciously berating himself for the lack of treatment he could give in their current situation. It wasn’t his fault, yet he he’d himself accountable.

When he reached the tear in the dark bodysuit, stretching from a few ribs up on his friend’s left to the lower side of his right abdomen Keith faltered. Gently brushing the loose fabric up his violet eyes found the half crusted crimson gash and bile burned hot at the base of his throat. Instinctively he swallowed the unwelcome sensation.

A pained groan rumbled in the darkness and Keith snatched his hand back like he’d been bit, eyes flying up to meet the face of the Blue Paladin.

Silence.

The young Blade waited a few more seconds before quietly easing back from Lance, his boots dragging along the sand slightly.

A mistake.

Lance reeled backwards at the sound, hands pushing him away from its direction and his head colliding against the wall behind him with a sickening crack. 

On instinct Keith reached out, latching onto a wrist in an attempt to keep his ex-teammate from harming himself further but the limb was snatched from him with more speed than the Blade through was humanly possible. In less than a tick Lance had cradled it to his chest, leaning away from the hand that previously held him.

“L-Lance?”

Keith hated the way his voice cracked.

Clearing his throat quickly he tried again: “Lance, it’s me…Keith.”

The injured form before him visibly tensed at the voice.

Neither of them moved.

Keith remained crouched with his hand still half outstretched from where he’d reached out to Lance and the Sharpshooter remained stark still like a deer in headlights, his chest heaving in silent breaths as he panicked.

Then Keith realised and quietly cursed at himself for being so stupid.

“I…shit. I’m sorry. I should have taken it off first. Here, let me help you.”

Reaching out Keith raised his hand, fingertips brushing against the shoddy rag concealing his friend’s vision.

But Lance’s hand beat him too it.

“N-n… NO!”

Lance’s hand clamped down on the rag, crushing it to his face and in that instance, he’d somehow leaned further from Keith.

The young Blade remained in shock, still trying to process the raw rasp that was supposed to pass as his ex-teammate’s voice. Recovering from the sound he moved carefully towards Lance again.

“Don’t be stupid, I can’t help you with it on.”

Keith advanced again, more strongly this time. He couldn’t understand for the life of him why Lance was overreacting so much over a damn blindfold.

It was pathetic.

There was no way he could treat him with it on and it would make it easier for both of them if Lance would just look at him.

The young Blade swung a leg carefully but deftly over his ex-teammate’s midsection, straddling him in place to stop him from moving further backwards. Reaching around the head that swung wildly to each side in a weak attempt to dislodge his hands, Keith began to pull loose the tacky knot at the rear.

“Y-you can’t… p-please!!”

He gritted his teeth, ignoring Lance’s protests. They were desperate now, more like gasps between the precious breaths he gained with hyperventilating. Finally, the Blade got a hold on the not ad tore the damn thing free.

Keith pulled back with the rag between his fingers, his violet eyes reflecting the pure horror of those before him: not ocean blue, but sightless grey eyes. Grey orbs that flickered uncertainly about his own form, trying and failing to identify exactly where they should be aiming.

Then Keith felt his body go cold and the air abandon his lungs, the blood draining from every limb as the realisation crashed down on him with unyielding intensity.

Lance…

Lance was blind.

 

* * *

 

 

Pain.

A throbbing clouding his head like thick fog smothers a riverbank.

His feet were in agony, one considerably more painful than the other, pounding at his pain receptors until for a delirious moment Lance thought it might actually prefer to be detached from his body. Yes. That might be better for both of them.

His whole body ached from where he had been slumped against something hard and his sore legs wallowed in the little pleasure that the soft floor game them. Soft floor that…

No, that wasn’t right.

None of the cells he’d ever visited had been-

Then he felt it, eyelids flying open behind their bandage as the overwhelming sense of being watched crawled into his skin, bringing the presence of another person nearby into crystal clarity.

As if on cue, to torment the reality, a scraping sound echoed in his ears and Lance’s body reacted without his permission, desperately trying to increase the distance from the presence so that it would lessen the strike of the blow.

No…

Oh god no.

 _No no_ _no no no_ …

He couldn’t, not this soon. He wasn’t ready. He couldn’t take another round of their twisted games so soon. He couldn’t-

“L-Lance?”

His body froze.

It was _his_ voice again. With it came all the crumbled pieces of Lance’s last dream. A dream where he was out of his cell and he was running. A dream so merciful Lance scarlessly believe such a thing could happen in one’s sleep. He’d even felt the wind on his skin and the crisp fresh air in his lungs.

“Lance, it’s me… Keith.”

A miniscule flicker of hope tried to ignite within but was snuffed out as fear coiled through the once-Sharpshooter’s veins. It tangled with his shamefully still-beating heart and poisoned his broken mind. None of that was a dream.

It was just another hallucination.

Another game.

Another little victory for the old hag who so loved to turn those he cared for into pawns and make them dance to her dark melodies.

The fear manifested and grew, scorching his lungs as he failed miserably to quell the terror it coaxed into existence within him.

“I…shit. I’m sorry. I should have taken it off first. Here, let me help you.”

‘ _…help you…_ ’

That didn’t make sense. How could a hallucination help him?

Within the mere second distraction the words had created, Lance felt fingertips ghost his skin and his disorientated mind screamed a thousand things at once.

One of those outshone the rest.

There was no way… he couldn’t… fake or not there was no way he could let them _see_.

Not him.

Not Keith of all people. Even if he was just a puppet version of the Red Paladin.

If they saw, if he realised what Lance had lost it would seal his fate of being cast out as a Paladin. It would confirm the death of his place among them as a Sharpshooter.

At some point in his panic Lance had tried to cry out. He knew now because of how much his throat hurt. It _burned_ , like acid was eating away at it from the inside.

“Don’t be stupid, I can’t help you with it on.”

Lance felt the contact brush against his nose again and tried to yank away but he was too slow this time. All too suddenly there were hand at the back off his head, tearing open the knot of the only thing left standing between him and his place among his friends

“Y-you can’t… p-please!!”

He tried to fight the one now straddling him in place, ignoring the fire in his throat and desperately trying to ward off the intruder. He kicked and scrambled against the ever-shifting floor at his feet but he was weak in comparison.

He was too damn weak.

He couldn’t let them see.

He couldn’t-

Then Lance felt the rag slip from his face as the chill of air filled its absence, embracing the wet tears that ran freely down his hollowed cheeks.

 

* * *

 

The air outside raged against the storm, creating a sense of unnatural calm within the fallen building’s entrance, where a small golden light flickered in the darkness to chase back nearby shadows. It’s small number of bright rays illuminated two figures within, one laying on his back with arms outstretched in the sand and the other straddling him with a look of pure shock riddling his face; laced with guilt. He opened his mouth twice to speak but couldn’t get the words out.

Eventually Lance attempted to wriggle out from beneath the weight that held him pinned, shoving it weakly off with his hand and trying to calm the short gasps of air that gushed in and out from his cracked lips.

Keith rolled with the shove, moving back from his position to sit heavily on the ground, slack jawed with one hand still half grasping the rag he’d just pulled loose.

“Lanc-“

“No. No more. J…just go.” Lance mumbled, curling slowly in on himself when his back finally hit something solid to lean against.

Keith just stared, trying to make sense of what had been said.

“I can’t go. You need to-“

“I won’t talk.”

A frown tugged at the young Blade’s eyebrows: “Talk about what?”

For a moment he watched Lance struggle to respond, uncertainty tugging at his features and making him look utterly torn.

“’bout anythin…anything. So…so just go.”

None of that made sense, none of this made any sense to Keith.

Then it hit him, like alcohol seeping into a fresh cut, except this realisation left him feeling as cold as ice. Lance, for whatever reason, didn’t think he was really here to help him. He didn’t think it was really Keith before him, but rather believe it to be somebody trying to gather intel. The wounded boy before him though this was an interrogation and he couldn’t even _see_ Keith to prove to himself it wasn’t.

The thought panicked Keith to the core and he wracked his brain, trying desperately to find a way to convince Lance that every single bit of this moment was real.

That _he_ was real.

“Lance…It’s me, Keith, from the…from Earth. Do you remember me?” Keith nearly chocked on the last two words, his throat constricting involuntarily. _‘What if he didn’t remember? What if he doesn’t recognise its me at all because… What if he has actually forgotten me?’_

Those few seconds felt like hours and in the far future (if there was one) Keith was sure they’d be the most fearful seconds of his life, complete with the overly expressive face of Lance as he clearly fought an internal battle to formulate a response.

When it did come, it was from a voice so broken and defeated Keith never wanted to hear anyone sound like that again. Especially not Lance.

“I…Do. I remember but…b-but you’re not r-really Keith.”

Inside Keith felt those words crush his heart. Outside his hand crushed a handful of grey sand he didn’t even remember digging his fingers into.

“I’m real. I’m real, why can’t you s-...” The young Blade swallowed his words before he could finish letting his damn mouth from make that mistake. His eyes fell to the floor as he searched for alternative words.

Back against the wall Lance sat as still as the stone he leaned against, his mind a chewed-up chaos as he his own want clashed violently with reasons. It hurt. It hurt so damn much he wanted to cry but he couldn’t.  Every single fibre of his being yearned for this to be real. It screamed at him to just hope… just to believe that Keith – the real Keith – was somewhere in front of him right now. He wanted so badly to hope that his dream had been real and his stupid rival from a better time had saved his sorry ass. Lance’s mind cried out for him to believe it, but it just wasn’t logical. None of this was. Keith, of all people, was least likely to know that he’d even been missing and he was meant to be somewhere else. Somewhere far away with the Blade of Marmora, safe from the mess Lance had landed in.

So it couldn’t be real. This wasn’t the real Keith.

Just as his mind was about to spell out the fact that this was another one of Haggar’s sick hallucinations, his mouth spewed words out of its own accord in a pathetic rasp he didn’t even recognise anymore:

“H-how…How can you prove it?”

Keith’s eyes snapped up, barely catching the whisper.

The atmosphere fell silent as he searched for an answer to Lance’s question.

‘God this would be so much easier if Lance could just _see_!’

‘If only…’

Then Keith rose slowly from where he sat and walked towards Lance, taking great care not to make any sudden movements. Still, he didn’t miss the way the Paladin tensed at the sound. Crouching next to Lance, he picked up his right hand and bit back the guilt he felt as the wounded other tried to pull free from the grasp. Holding the hand firmly, he brought it up in line with the nape of his neck and buried Lance’s fingers in his mullet.

It was stupid, but it was all he could think of.

Lance was so damn expressive it left a twisting sensation in his gut. Keith watched, hope shining in his eyes as he silently begged for this to work. He watched as Lance’s expression melt from fear and uncertainty to confusion and then to hope that mirrored Keith’s own, only Lance’s held a heart-wrenching essence of disbelief to it.

At some point the Sharpshooter had stopped resisting and the young Blade had released his hold on the wrist. Slowly the shaking fingers curled into the hair at the nape of his neck, as if searching for the hidden fault in his own design.

“K-Keith…?” Lance mouthed, tears welling up in his sightless eyes that failed to meet Keith’s face by millimetres.

“You made fun of me for this.”

It was all Keith could say and it came out strained in an attempt to keep his own eyes from leaking.

Lance was considerably less successful though and tears ran freely from clouded eyes down his battered cheeks as the truth visibly sunk in. There was no way this was a trick. Haggar had no way of knowing how his persistent remarks about Keith's ancient haircut played such a close role in his rivalry because she didn't understand it. She didn't understand any form of raillery or affection from any of his memories.

“Keith-“

“You even nicknamed me after this. _Mullet_. You called me Mullet.”

He choked on the nickname, his words now caught somewhere between a laugh and a sob as he let relief drown him, so consumed by it that he didn’t even register Lance’s fingers still tangled in his Mullet. The light grip their remained while Keith waited for Lance to speak, half expecting a comeback.

But this time, for the first time ever, Lance didn’t have one.

That scared Keith more than he dared to admit.

Instead the Blue Paladin’s chapped lips pressed together tightly, wobbling slightly into a half attempt at a smile that looked all too difficult for the cocky Sharpshooter he knew.

Before Keith knew what he was doing he wrapped his hand gently around the back of Lances head and drew him into a loose hug, violet eyes fixing on the wall while his ex-teammate quietly calmed himself down, hidden from view by the armoured chest plate he now rest his forehead against.

 

* * *

 

Once Lance had calmed down a little and Keith had beaten his own thoughts back into a sturdy mindset an uneasy but welcome silence had settled over them both. Lance had agreed to staying propped up against what Keith had informed him was some form of crumbling concrete wall and remained as still as possible while he had his wounds grimly attended to.

After a very brief conversation, the wounded one had discovered he had his ex-teammate to thank for the subtle decrease in pain now radiating from his feet and a variety of other areas. Many hisses, curses, mumbled “sorry”s and “stay still”s later, the one Lance vaguely remembered acquiring across his chest when he was first captured was also temporarily bound.

A small eternity passed before the Blade decided he’d done what he could and slid his back down the wall to sit beside Lance. His violet eyes appeared dull in the small light his torch had to offer as he tried to come to terms with the sheer number of wrongs that had been wrought upon the Blue Paladin.

The physical wounds didn’t belong there but most of them could be healed with the proper treatment and time… a lot of time. Lance’s sight though…they had taken his goddamn sight! That wasn’t all though: the way Lance had ‘looked’ at him earlier, the way he’d dismissed Keith’s own existence like he expected some sick trick to torment him all along...

_‘His mind, what had they done to his mind?’_

Keith barely had time to excuse himself before leaving. He rounded a corner that he hoped was far enough away from which to be unheard and emptied what little was left in his guts into a sandy crevasse of the fallen building.

The Sharpshooter heard though, his brow furrowing as distant retching sounds caught his eardrums. True to his word though Keith returned a few dobashes later and resumed his previous seat somewhere beside him.

Neither said a word. Both of them listened in silence to the raging storm outside, battering the mostly barren landscape with unchecked force and sending loose rumble smashing into to once great structures, now laying almost entirely in their graves.

The young Blade popped the cap of his water canteen and took a sparing sip before offering it up to his companion’s cracked lips.

“Here, it’s water. Drink some.”

Hesitantly Lance raised his hands, the slight tremble still there when he felt for the shape of the canteen and took it in both hands.

The water he gulped down burned his throat, nearly bringing fresh tears to his sightless eyes. 

It hurt.

It was borderline agony.

It felt beautiful.

The Sharpshooter managed all of three swallows before he reluctantly pulled it away from his lips and held it out in the direction where it’s owner sat. He wanted more, he wanted all of it, but it wasn’t his to take and he already knew it was probably all they had. 

“Do you want any more?” Keith asked, a slight frown tugging at his eyebrows. Each gulp of water that had hit the Paladins stomach had been audible, morbidly confirming the young Blade's assumption that he was probably running on an empty stomach. 

Lance could hear the concern but he nodded his head anyway, much to his own inner protests.

Saying no more the young Blade took back the canteen and capped it but as he looked up again something more concerning caught his eyes.

Lance was shivering, much more than earlier. His thin arms were wrapped around his midsection and his knees were drawn up in a poor attempt to conserve heat. The black paladin suit was all he wore, aside from the stolen cloak. It was designed to retain body heat in a good range of temperatures, but the suit was broken. It was ripped in a number of places, exposing the tan skin beneath at varying levels to the cold air that was even beginning to reach Keith’s bones. Except Keith was wearing his bodysuit and his full Blade of Marmora armour.

Frowning, the young Blade pulled off his own stolen cloak and swung it over the Blue Paladins shaking shoulders.

Lance jumped at the unexpected contact and Keith inwardly berated himself for forgetting the other couldn’t see.

“You’re cold. It’s not much but it might help.”

Finally understanding what was going on, Lance leaned forwards and accepted the additional merger covering, pulling both cloaks tighter around his body to ward off the cold.

“Th-thanks,” Lance mumbled, slumping back against the wall.

Several moments passed before Keith spoke again.

“So…I’ve never heard on the planet were on right now, but hopefully it won’t stay this cold for…

“Lance?”

No response came and Keith turned his head to discover why. At some point Lance must have drifted off, his head now slumped slightly to the side where is brushed against Keith’s armoured shoulder pad. The wounded Paladin looked so unlike Lance, even in his sleep. The lines on his face told tales of the most recent past he never should have endured and Keith wished he could have done more for his ex-teammate. He wished he had something on him, anything. Even a mild painkiller. Though he had nothing of the sort in his standard deployment pouch. Nothing aside from the water, two food pills, a Protein Bar (uncustomary to the package – Keith’s own addition: the result of skipping breakfast) and what the Blade called an E-shot. That, plus the stolen target of his failed mission.

 _‘At least,’_ he thought, _‘At least while Lance is sleeping he is out of pain… for now.’_

Reaching out Keith flicked the torchlight off, allowing the natural darkness to enshroud them both in its glorious cover while the exhaustion finally caught up to him and dragged him down into a restless sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thank you so much for giving this a read and for all your kudos and comments! I hope you liked this Chapter and feel free to leave any constructive feedback on it or the fiction as a whole.
> 
> Until next time!


	7. Unknown Lands

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Keith and Lance play their hand against unmapped terrain in a gamble to stay alive.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I don't really have an excuse for my absence...well I have many (some good, some not so great events transpired) but I guess it they can all be poorly summed under the word "life". 
> 
> Anyway, more to the point, I hope you all enjoyed the Voltron finale (I haven't seen it yet so please no spoilers)!  
> Also here is the next chapter...

When Keith woke it was to the sharp pain of his muscles screaming at him for sleeping with a crooked neck, paired with a complete lack of sensation in his bum from having drifted off while sat firmly on both buttocks. Groaning he slowly eased his head upright and his rear from the sandy floor, taking his weight onto both palms and attempting to distract himself from his protesting body by opening his eyes. He half expected a blindingly bright white of sunrise to lash out at them.

Though no white light came. Neither did the darkness of night.

Instead a soft cerise light greeted violet irises as it bounced off the interior walls of their resting place, daring to fight back the lingering shadows of night and weaving its warm rays into the grey sands beneath. Its appearance was strikingly artificial yet so naturally enticing in a wildly contrasting manner.

A gentle thud alerted the dark-haired Blade to a presence at his right and he felt his heart skip, nearly flying to his feet in a mad rush to face what had probably just frightened two weeks off his life. Beside him sat Lance, slumped over in his sleep: one hand slung over his legs and the other on the sand beside him where it had just fallen from his lap. Letting out a steady breath he relaxed. The brunette remained captured by a merciful unconscious and seemingly at peace if it weren’t for the frown creasing his brow and the light sweat that glistened there.

The young Blade’s eyes lingered on the closed lids of the other then, his mind forcing him to relive the horror of realisation from the night before. The crystal-clear memory stuck out painfully loud beside others, robbing him of any chance to simply shove it away to deal with later. A skill he’d developed way back during his Garrison days on Earth. Swallowing hard Keith forced himself to look away from his sleeping companion and he silently rose to his feet, making his way to the shattered rubble entrance through which he’s pulled them both last night.

Khiro, as it turns out, had one Sun and was nothing like Earth’s at all. Far off over the horizon of a giant red orb was peeking out at the world, starting the slow process of chasing away the night as it ascends into the ever-lightening sky above. What little light showed was a brilliant crimson red that dance across the grey sand dunes and teased between the rubble remnants of a fallen civilisation. Wherever light touched it seemed to burst of a cerise reflection and the little heat they offered coiled around nearby objects that were far and few in the barren dessert. The darkness receded into what Keith assumed was the West while the land bowed before the tranquility sunrise bestowed upon it’s cool surface.

It was eerily beautiful.

Turning away from the waking world outside the young Blade made his way back towards Lance, hesitating in his stride before crouching beside his companion. Carefully he reached out, wrapping one arm around the wounded other’s shoulders and cradling his head in the other for support before slowly lowering him to lay flat on the sandy surface. Every slight movement Keith held his breath and when Lance twitched he paused for almost a minute, desperately trying not to wake him.

He was better off asleep where the pain from his wounds could not grasp him as tightly.

Part of Keith berated himself for not being able to make his ex-teammate more comfortable, but his more rational half tampered down those thoughts and left him sitting upon the surface a few feet away from the Blue Paladin with his knees half drawn up. It compelled him to thoroughly assess their unfavourable situation (though on second thought perhaps that was putting it too lightly). At present they were stranded on an Alien planet, located somewhere in the middle of this ecosystem’s equivalent of a desert and hiding in amongst the almost entirely buried rubble of what he could only assume was a long gone civilisation that had once inhabited this world. The only vehicle he’d manage to steal from the Galra was strictly for surface reconnaissance and was stowed a couple of miles out with virtually no charge left. So jumping on a hovercraft and gliding out of the dessert terrain wasn’t an option. Neither was robbing the turret from the back seat as he had no means to power it and the added weight would be a problem for travelling on foot.

Either way they would have to continue on foot which was where Keith’s mind honed in on their biggest dilemma. Should they continue on foot?

If they leave they would both be highly exposed, increasing the risk of being captured by a patrol that was sure to be searching for them. He also had absolutely no idea of how this planet’s days worked, how long they were, how hot the environment would get during the day, how stable the weather patterns were. That being said, if it was anything like the desserts back on Earth then they would be throwing themselves in front of death if they left and were unable to find water or shelter within a couple of days after departing.

On the other hand, staying here amongst the rubble was also suicidal. By waiting, they would be residing themselves to the soul hope of a rescue within a few days, providing they could struggle through dehydration and the temperature changes that long. Since he’d left on a Mission, Keith was certain nobody was coming. The Blade never returned for those who had not grasped victory.

Victory or death. There was no in between.

In choosing to abandon his mission, Keith had chosen death in the eyes of the Blade of Marmora. Hope of rescue from them was never even a card on the table.

That left Lance.

Even now, after rattling his brain for nearly an hour Keith couldn’t figure out why nobody had come for Lance yet. A fair number of his injuries were at least a couple of weeks old, so Voltron’s members must have known their Blue Paladin was missing a while back. Yet nobody had mentioned anything to the Blade of Marmora, despite a sworn agreement to disclose all significant changes that might influence the resistance efforts immediately. Therefore, he could only assume that Lance had been captured no more than two weeks ago and the Castle of Lions was looking for him. Or they weren’t looking for Lance at all…

Keith really hoped he was wrong about the latter.

In short, chance of a rescue in such a short space of time felt slim and Keith didn’t have the resources to keep them both alive for long here. They’d die within days. Maybe a week at most.

Their only option was to move forwards. To leave and pray to whatever gods were out there that they’d find a way out of the grey dessert. That is, if there even was a way out.

The only problem was Lance. In his current state, Keith wasn’t even sure he could walk. The young Blade couldn’t carry him either, not for very long. From his brief sunrise viewing violet eyes had already determined there was no sight of life beyond the grey dunes, nor could he clearly identify a direction in which to travel.

Absorbed in his thoughts, the young Blade had failed to register the lack of even breathing beside him as Lance woke, his wounded body tensing as he shallowed his breathing so it could no longer be heard.

Keith felt something squeeze his stomach when he realised the Paladin’s unnatural stillness.

“You’re awake.”

Slowly the tension in the muscles eased slightly and Lance shifted, awkwardly trying to position his malnourished limbs beneath him in an attempt to sit up. It took him painfully longer than it should have and Keith remained sat a small distance away, fighting the urge to help but never moving an inch.

With his legs half crossed and his brown hair flopped over his forehead, shading sightless eyes from view, the other worked his lips as is trying to decide what to say.

“Where…where are we?”

It was a raspy echo of a once cheerful voice. Keith hated that.

“A planet called Khiro.”

Lance frowned.

Keith mentally kicked himself when he remember Lance couldn’t see.

“It’s a desert I think. Or this planet’s equivalent of one. We’re in a graveyard of ruins so a civilisation must have inhabited this world long ago.”

There was a slight nod of dirty brown hair then silence while the Blue Paladin shifted uncomfortably where he sat.

“We don’t have water out here.”

It wasn’t a question.

“No,” Keith confirmed.

“We won’t… we can’t stay here…”

“No,” Keith paused. Lance wasn’t stupid. He knew as well as him what that they would have to move out, so the young Blade bit back his guilt and asked: “Can you walk?”

Shock flooded the tanned features when the Cuban raised his head high enough to reveal clouded eyes. His face had always been a tapestry of emotions on show for the whole world to see, the complete opposite of Keith, so when his expression flicked insanely fast between emotions and something resembling momentary fear carved subtle creases into Lance’s brow the young Blade allowed himself to look away.

It was a long while before Lance schooled his expression and spoke again.

“Yesterday-…or was it night?”

“Night.”

“Y-yeah. I thought…was there a transport?”

“Yes. It was a Galran hovercraft, like the bike I had on Earth.”

Lance nodded slowly.

“It’s dead. Out of charge,” Keith concluded.

The Blue Paladin visibly slumped as he tried to hide the hope that had just been shattered.

Keith looked away again, berating himself for the poor planning ahead that had landed him and an injured Lance in such a dire predicament.

Suddenly the sand stated shifting before him and Keith hurled to his feet in record timing as he lunged towards the swaying Paladin. While the young Blade had been self-absorbed in thought Lance had forced himself up on torn feet, pain etched on his face and his significantly more damaged leg giving way instantly and nearly sending his head crashing into a stone wall.

“What were you thinking?!” He yelled, yanking on Lance’s wrist to pull his fall away from the stone and shifting the weight so he could help him stand.

He half expected a sarcastic retort.

“I don’t want to go back there.”

Keith felt like he’d been punched in the stomach. It was so uncharacteristic of the loud-mouthed, self-proclaimed Kogane rival to be so bluntly honest that he was overwhelmingly grateful Lance was unable to see the shock in his violet eyes.

“Are you sure about this?” The Blade hesitated but the Blue Paladin’s expression never faltered from the determined one he currently wore.

When no answer came Keith took the silence to be a ‘yes’ and guided one of Lance’s hands to the remains of a wall where he could support himself before setting about gathering what little resources they had. Once they were tired in a makeshift cloth pouch Keith donned the smaller cloak, cut short from bandaging the Paladin’s wounds, and swung the second one over Lance’s shoulders.

The Cuban slowly pulled up his hood while Keith secured the pouch over his shoulders. He was about to announce they were ready to head out when a quiet, strained voice touched his ears.

“Keith?”

Violet eyes looked up to the man beside him, holding onto wall and slouched over in pain with his good foot bearing all the weight left on him.

“Yeah?”

“Can I have the cloth back please?”

Keith was confused. Lance's sightless eyes remained on the grey sands at his feet, wearing an expression of shame. 

“The one that was on my head?”

Suddenly the air caught in the young Blade’s throat as realisation came crashing down on him like a landslide.

Lance wanted to cover his eyes back up. He didn’t want anyone to see them even though Keith already knew. He was ashamed to have them visible.

Keith had to swallow. Hard.

He reached into the pouch and pulled out the ratty old rag, using the delay to steal his voice before responding.

“Yeah. Here,” He said, gently reaching out to Lance’s wandering free hand and placing the fabric inside his palm.

Slowly lance shifted his weight so his back was against the wall. Reaching up with slightly shaking arms he pushed the fabric against clouded eyes and fumbled with forming a double knot behind his head.

Keith watched beside him, his mind a mess at the simple but crushing request. Part of him wanted to help but he knew that would only hurt Lance more, to realise that Keith had gone as far as insulting him with a such a gesture.

“Thanks,” the Paladin whispered, pushing away from the wall unsteadily.

Keith moved to his side to support his ex-teammate.

Together they set out into the waking desert of a foreign land.

Together they lay down their bet, gambling their lives in the wasteland of Khiro in an effort to survive.

 

* * *

 

The sun beat down billions of rays to Khiro, their crimson-gold light so brilliantly hot that they almost appeared white as they lashed out at the surface. The heat had baked the grey sands of the barren wasteland, attempting to pry non-existent moisture from between the rough grains. Every so often the dessert would cough out a weak puff of air that rustled the surface of tall sand dunes before vanishing into a motionless dry heat that wrapped itself tightly around all it touched.

Somewhere within the desolate wilderness two figures moved at slow pace, dark hooded cloaks fending off the harmful radiation but offering no salvation from the heat that seeped through all items of clothing. It must have been vargas now since their bodies had started to sweat, quickly drenching their attire and plastering their hair to the backs of their necks.

Keith panted from the exertion of lugging more than his own weight through the brutal dessert heat while Lance breathed harder beside him. One lanky arm draped over the young Blade’s shoulders where he held it securely by the wrist, as he attempted to alleviate what his wounded companion had to carry himself. Despite his efforts though Lance’s soles had already started seeping crimson fluid from beneath the make-shift bandages, dying their black colour even darker and allowing sand grains to stick to their wet surface.

When they had first set out Lance had bit back the occasional groan and whimper poorly enough so that it was still just about audible. Now, beyond desperate the gulps of sun-baked air that dragged across cracked lips, he didn’t make a sound.

The pain was everywhere but none of his ailments even came close to comparing with that which radiated from his feet. Every step he took felt like a step onto the white tips of fire heated rods. He wanted to scream and wither away from it but the sun had sucked any energy he had to do so from the very pores of his skin. At one point he came dangerously close to giving in to his body’s attempts at succumbing to gravity but he feared that if he fell down now he’d never get back up.

Upon reflection, that wouldn’t have been such a bad idea if he was alone. He could just give into the pain that would pull him into an unconscious state before the sun drew every droplet of water from his damaged body. If he was lucky he’d just fall asleep and never wake up.

Lance couldn’t do that though because he wasn’t alone. Through all the agony that pierced his mind the Paladin was still party aware of Keith beside him, and fully aware of the amount of his own weight that the Blade carried. That of all things made Lance guilty to the core. It was his fault Keith was out here now, in what may as well have been the fires of hell, instead of getting some well-earned rest after another successful mission.

Time slipped into an incalculable space for both young men as they pushed on further. Driven by the need to gain distance from the enemy and the will to survive that had been engraved into their existence. It felt like an eternity before the sun finally slipped from its maximum height, unnoticed by either of the wandering black specks on Khiro’s grey lands.

“K-…eith?”

It had been so long since either of them had made a sound that Keith might have jumped when Lance’s pained whisper broke the silence. That was, if he wasn’t too hot to even reply of course.

Slowly Keith turned his head as they walked to look at Lance. The Sharpshooter limped awkwardly beside him, one free shoulder slumped down and his face downcast as if he’d fallen asleep sitting upright with his chin almost resting upon his chest. It didn’t go unnoticed by Keith that nearly a mile back the arm of his companion over his shoulder had grown heavier but still Lance had carried on without talking so he continued as if nothing had changed.

Looking at him now though, Keith could see he wouldn’t be able to carry on for much longer. It was a miracle they’d made it this far and even he was desperate for a break. Between the warm sweat dripping down his brow and the hot air that scorched his lungs the young Blade had almost reach his limit. He could own imagine that lance had probably passed his long ago.

“We can’t stop here. We’re in the open.” He rasped, his dry throat protesting against speech.

Lance gulped at the air beside him as a vicious pant racked his malnutrition form. Eventually he managed a nod.

The lack of response, or more specifically the lack of retort, worried Keith but he could hardly blame him.

Nearly another mile later a dark form broke the omnipresent grey surface, ruining the perfectly smooth landscape. It went unnoticed by Keith until he was barely 50 metres from it, his reaction time and awareness significantly subdued by the blistering heat.

He thought about saying something to Lance but the effort was better used on getting them both the rocky protrusion in the ground. It wasn’t even 6 metres high, but it cast a small shadow upon the ground that gave the young Blade a sense of gratitude with more magnitude than he’d ever felt before.

When his boots first slipped into the shadow Keith began to lower Lance in an attempt to lay him down gently, but the second they stopped moving his knees had collapsed beneath him and the arm Keith was holding nearly slipped from his grasp as all of Lance’s weight was suddenly transferred to him. He lowered his injured ex-teammate the rest of the way until he was lying flat on his back before flopping down heavily nearby, forcing the hot air into his lungs like he’d nearly drowned.

Keith dared to crack open his eyes to the world above him. The regret came instantly along with a flurry of rainbow coloured spots that danced in the all-too-bright sky. Throwing his arm over his eyes he tried to focus on evening out his breathing and slowing his heart rate. His muscles burned. Above him the hazy blue sky shimmered and blurred before melting into darkness.

 

* * *

 

 

A soft breeze crawled between the crack in the ancient rock, its warm air gliding so gently over all it touched that it was hardly noticeable. Lightly hoping around each surface, it bounced and danced, swirled and soared, caressing the dirty strands of brown hair as it passed the boy in the blindfold.

That was the first thing Lance was aware of when he woke, his mind still clouded buy the scorching onslaught of heat. Only now it was a little cooler. Uncomfortably warm, but no longer unbearable. Almost like…

Lance opened his eyes, vaguely aware that he was lying on his back in what felt like sand. Slowly, battling lethargy, he raised his hand from the ground, his whole arm shaking against his will. He fought to banish the involuntary tremor unsuccessfully as his fingertips reached the rag over his eyes.

For a moment they just hovered there. Then they curled around the unclean cloth and pried one edge up over his right eye.

Lances breath hitched.

He didn’t know what he had been expecting. 

He'd been childishly hopeful to think he'd see anything. 

Defeated he released his hold on the bandage, letting it fall back over his sightless eyes and ignoring his hand as it crashed back into the sandy surface, limp one more.

Uncomfortably warm, but no longer unbareable. Almost like a sunset. It had been so long since he had seen a sunset. Sometimes he dreamed of seeing one again back home, back on Earth with his little brother and sister Veronica. He remembers when they used to crawl onto the rooftop of their house, much to his Mama’s horror, with hot chocolate in their hands and a single blanket between the three of them. They didn’t need any more to keep them warm. They had each other as they watched the beautiful bands of purple and blue, orange and yellow dance across a sky of rose pink and crimson red before swimming beyond the horizon to make way for the night. Lance had always hoped that his siblings would still be young enough when he returned to watch at least one more sunset like they used to.

Only now he would never see a sunset again.

He wouldn’t be able to see his family.

He wasn’t sure he ever wanted them to see him, not like this.

Lance’s breath lodged in his throat as a hand clutched at his heart. It felt like a boa was constricting his chest, squeezing the life from him and all the while his breaths came harder and faster than he wanted them too. He felt himself losing control, slipping into a blind panic he couldn’t fend off.

In a last effort to distract himself he tried to call out to Keith but his voice barely uttered a croak.

They had to get up. They had to get moving, even though he couldn’t remember why.

He tried again and again until finally he managed “eith” but it wasn’t enough. The moisture in his throat had deserted him long ago.

Drained of energy and defeated Lance gave up, his body falling limp as he succumbed to the silence that was beginning to eat a hole in his heart. He was too lost in his own thoughts to notice the breeze slipping through his hair, wrapping the tears that slipped out from beneath his covered eyes in its warm embrace.

 

* * *

 

Keith sat bolt upright, heart racing as he forced himself to orientate with his surroundings. He hadn’t meant to fall asleep, he’d only intended to rest for a short while.

Eye’s wide with adrenaline he glanced up at the sky above, no longer filled with the brilliant red sun but smothered in a blanket of midnight blue and speckled with silver starlight. The rock they’d collapsed under loomed ominously over him and the grey sands rustled in the subtle chill the night air carried. The temperature had dropped significantly since earlier, enough to send shivers down his spine despite the armour.

Not good.

If Keith could feel the cold then Lance definitely would...

LANCE.

Stumbling over his own limbs in haste the young Blade crawled over to the limp figure beside him and rolled him over onto his lap.

“Lance? Lance, come on buddy, wake up.” Gently shaking his shoulders Keith tried to wake him, his eyes briefly assessing the wounded Paladin’s body.

Lance was already shivering, the slight gasps through cracked lips merged into a pained groan as the shaking roused him from a light sleep.

“Come on, we need to get moving.”

As carefully as he could Keith pulled Lance to his feet, arms bracing against the other’s wobbling form as he become accustomed to standing on wounded soles once more. Tugging an arm over his shoulders he relieved some weight from his wounded companion and walked, fueled by an urge to get away from the rock that jutted out of the flat surface. Staying here was far too dangerous. Staying next to such a landmark in this otherwise barren place would make them far too easy to find, and they’d already lingered far too long.

How long had it been? How long were the days here?

They moved in an almost straight path, or at least, Keith hoped it was straight but there was no way of telling when everything looked the same. Unlike earlier the exertion was a welcome one for the young Blade that helped generate precious body heat as the temperature plummeted even further. Within a mere mile the air he breathed became visible and the sand they walked on felt like a bed of diamonds crunching beneath their feet.

It was then he saw it.

An enormous dark landmass up ahead, stretching far over this wasteland and reaching high above the ground. It might have been a forest but in such poor lighting it appeared only as a dark shadow cast upon the ground. Ominous and foreboding. 

The sight caught Keith off guard. If he’d been paying more attention to what was ahead instead of his feet he might have seen it emerge a lot sooner. It was an eerie but welcome sight. It’s shadows might conceal all manner of things but for now it was their only hope at hiding from whatever Galra might be hunting them. A safe haven from the open lands they currently wandered. 

“-eith,” Lance rasped beside him between irregular pants. The wounded Paladin had felt his Keith hesitate. Letting his chin fall to his chest he tried to draw enough breath to continue: “Where…'ere are we going?”

For a long while Keith didn’t respond and they continued walking in silence. Lance feared he hadn’t tried hard enough, hadn’t spoken loud enough to be heard but before he could try again Keith answered.

“I don’t know, Lance.”

It was the truth. Keith had no idea where they were heading or what lay ahead. He hadn't know anything beyond the Galra base they'd deserted. 

For the first time since abandoning his mission Keith felt the true weight of everything that had transpired. 

He felt an unsettling emotion stirring inside him and buried beneath it was a small spark of fear, unkindled and waiting in the darkness depth of his mind. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Honestly this Chapter was HARD to write. I've lost count of how many times I left it and revisited it in the past few months. It was one of those infamous filler chapters that are needed to progress the story but where unnecessarily difficult to write.  
> I apologise if this one is not quite what you were expecting but I hope the next one can make up for that with a little more action.  
> Until next time!

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Please feel free to leave a comment, let me know what you think or your thoughts on where this is going. Constructive feedback is always welcome.
> 
> I will do my best to update as often as possible but please be mindful that I am approaching my end of semester for this year and have many other commitments outside of writing fanfiction. I am also going to try and keep the chapters around the same length and reasonably sized so updates may also be slower as I take the time to work on these.


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